John Craun: Four Poems

ACCOUNTS

Affection says: sometimes
you make the meal
for the bowl. The store closed
                 We liked the shape 
            of the awning

            and scenes of hell—
   some of the scenes of hell—

by Blake. What to sell?
Even the teller couldn’t say

 

CRUNCH TIME

You know what time it is,
and which sunset,
and are demonstrably chapped

by clichés (can we say
this?) and clichés—
the sum—
               of which…

               and what
it is to want to wish,
and have gone ahead

 

PUSH COMES TO SHOVE

Narcissus
was pushed from behind
There was too much float

not enough sinker
Narcissus pushed someone from behind—

he was doing the pushing
He saw himself doing the pushing,

then turning as he fell then felt
the weight at the end of the line

 

UNIVERSAL AMSTERDAM

What shall we call
the boat downstream
at anchor, nose

 

and the boat
approaching so slowly
I

 

and the other boats
behind the boats downstream…

             spectacular foreign names

 

 


John Craun lives a few blocks from the Mississippi River in New Orleans, Louisiana.