Poems by E.M. Schorb

RX:  THE FLOWER CURE

Cerato for self-doubt, a cause of sexual
dysfunction.  Mix with Aspen. Make a tea.
Gentian leaves relieve depres­sion.  Make
a broth with a dash of Sweet Chestnut. 
Also, for gloom and melancholia, Mustard
Flowers.  Impatiens for impatience.  Make
a soup of gold, add black olives to allay
mental fatigue, and Hornbeam for de­-
crepitude.  Then go to the Holly­bush for
vigor.  If your love re­mains indifferent,
offer a few sips of Clematis. But heed this,
lover, heed this:  Take your love into the
country and pick these flowers to­gether!

READY TO WALK

Lipstick and mascara
are the bright spots of the room.
She reflects in the mirror,
one of her is there,
then the other. 
What is that blue shadow in the mirror,
lack of silver?  That cloudiness is a secret.
Paints her face
to the point of erotic innocence,
hiding the plain true innocence. 
Paints over her brown eyes
with green paint,
paints over her white lips
with red paint,
paints a red bull’s-eye
on her stretch-marked belly,
paints her other lips,
powders her other cheeks. 
Sprays a garden down her front,
lifts it up and sprays some more. 
Studies the heart-tattoo on her thigh. 
Studies the crooked tattoos on her arms,
palms up, in the mirror,
then applies creamy foundation.
A new beauty mark has appeared,
several.  She tells herself,
“I want to see my baby again.”
Then she slips into her soiled
golden slippers, ready to walk.

THE GETAWAY

There was a rosy dawn in the mountains,
but it was the city he needed;
there were morning stars; but he needed the rain-wet
ashcans and the morning Danish.
He needed the containered coffee and the dank puddled streets
and the steam up like a seeping vapor out of hell
from the drains and the hellbent crowds
walking right over the tops of taxis
in the impossible pace; he needed
the banana-peeled gutters and the knife in the back
and the long low slow limos with ominous dark windows.

There was a rosy dawn in the mountains
and there were early morning stars and a scimitar moon
and the cabin hung over the cliff and groaned
and the rainbow trout would jump right into your net
and you could breakfast on trout every morning
and while you ate the sun would run along the cliff
and turn everything into gold.
You could write all morning to the warbling
in an ornithologist’s dream; but he needed
the poem of the city in order to write of his hero,
the gumshoe, the poor sucker the city folks loved.