Three Poems by Eric Evans

The Bounce House of Our Room

I am, I declare, this tall and want

to ride the roller coaster of your

spine, the teacup of your underarm,

the tilt-o-whirl of your belly, tossing

me to and fro, side to side, havoc

on my balance and wonderfully so.  

Ticket in hand and I want to spin

on the carousel of your roundabout

hips, pinned to the curve of your

accommodating ribs, the jewel-eyed

horse's gallop matched in stride by

the lust-filled lion's eager pursuit.  

Front of the line and I make my way

past the fun house mirror of your

nightstand towards the water slide

of your calves and thighs and into

the bounce house of our room, with

it's flaps tied tight and our shoes

in a pile outside, there to be retrieved

at a much later hour.

***

Dictatorship

Maybe the dictators have it right

and sometimes a coup is the answer.

Honestly, who among us hasn't had

the impulse to round up the henchmen

and storm the embassy, to set up

the barricades and declare ourselves

unequivocally in charge?  

Who hasn't fought the urge to shout

down the opposition, to silence the

critics if only for an hour or a day?

Who out there has never known down

to the marrow the rightness of

his argument, the infallibility of his

point-of-view.  

And who, I ask you, has yet to believe

he could do it faster, stronger,

cleaner and smarter, hasn't sensed

the wasting away of time lost to

lesser plans and smaller scales?

Who, I'll ask yet again, has never

once felt his fingers burn with

the itch to brandish the sword of

his unquestioned will, impervious

to the consequences in store and

indifferent to their sting.

***

The Curse of Competence

One day we'll become those people,

she and I, and cast off the reins of

responsibility, reverse the curse of

competence for a less-directed

course.  We'll no longer be the trusted

ones, the good sons and daughters,

keepers of every secret, soothers

of every jangled nerve, beacons of

such misaligned hope.  

One day we'll call it all quits

and abscond with our backpacks

and inhibitions to some Mediterranean

resort for an indefinite stay of

wine, debauchery and criminality,

finding ourselves naked and tattooed

on a deserted beach with strands

of garland in our hair and mythical

stories to tell.  

One day we'll spend the currency

of our goodwill like the lottery,

burning every bridge in a ritualistic

bonfire, loin clothes flapping in the

sea breeze as we dance and sweat

and curse the hours spent on lesser

things, bellies full, eyes closed and

mouths open, flakes of ash sticking

to the surface of our dampening skin

as we embrace and tunnel our way

down to the beginnings of obscurity.

Eric Evans is a writer and musician from living in Rochester, New York. His work has appeared in Artvoice, Blind Man's Rainbow, Tangent Magazine, Posey, Lucid Moon, Poetry Motel, Hazmat, Remark and many other publications as well as a few anthologies. He has published six full collections and two broadsides as well as a broadside through Lucid Moon Press.