2 Poems
Family Tradition
I planted an apple tree in my backyard.
200 years later, it uprooted my house.
Bad apple tree! my great great great
grandchildren screamed, and they chopped
and they chopped and they chopped
the last of my life away.
Time Out
They say Dave Brubeck but come on
what you really hear all the time is
Paul Desmond, saxophone. I wonder
if Dave Brubeck, piano, was annoyed
by that Paul Desmond,
saxophone. I wonder it if ever resulted
in fisticuffs. I try to imagine Dave
Brubeck’s fists, or Dave Brubeck’s hands
picking up a piano in order that he might
smite Paul Desmond. And then I try to imagine
Paul Desmond picking up a saxophone in order
to likewise or preemptively smite Dave Brubeck
and as we speak, he is doing just that! Paul Desmond
is picking up a saxophone but Paul Desmond is picking up
a saxophone in order to play Blues Rondo À La Turk. Soon he
shall be sweaty, soon Dave Brubeck will smile upon him
lovingly, with thoughts of years and notes and ivory and
gold, with a love forged of the metals and wood of such
memories, and perhaps chastened, a bit, by sweat.
Ricky Garni lives in suburban North Carolina and works as a photographer and writer. His work has been published most recently in the Blake Jones Review, Tilted House, and Can We Have Our Ball Back? A GLORIOUS GALLOP V. AN ADAGIO OF INDIFFERENCE—his latest, lengthy collection—was released in December, 2020.
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