The greasy photographer with his comb-over,
with his free plastic comb which break immediately
in my kinked hair, tilts my chin off-kilter.
One hand grasps my shoulder, twists me closer
towards the camera; his other hand
trails my breast, over my sweater.
He says, Say boys stink and stinky
cheese socks to make me grin.
In science class we learn about the body
from a plastic skeleton. He's strung up
with filament and screws, technically sexless,
dances with clicks when he's moved.
We are focusing on the skull, which sits,
detached, on the lab table.
There is only one ethmoid bone, says Mr. Shuman,
and it has a different consistency
than the other bones in the head.
He writes on the board, ETHMOID:
DELICATE, SPONGY, LOCATED
BETWEEN THE EYES.
The photographer says, Look at the camera,
then look at the birdie, flutters his fingers
between the lenses, and actually tweets.
He squeezes a plastic bulb like blood pressure,
then smiles as if he's just blown up a building,
not lit my visage on fire with flash.
How I long for erasure, a third eye
to beam me from the stage where I sit,
passive, off-kilter, knees together,
hands folded neatly in my lap.
- Improv' : Pregnancy Pictures with Mommy
of his starving fohawk--sucking up the last drop of jelly,
choking on matted clumps of vicious cationic polymers;
those con-artist denims and the checkered-flannel button
down make mom regret the appointment. She recoils,
trying to crawl inside with me, but space is limited. I hear
him say, Let me get the baby-oil, the camera always perks
up...and I hear the little one even smiles. Immediately,
sadistic splashes of slippery rain fall on the roof of my
house, and I feel the scaly, flake-like fingers attempt to
tickle me like mommy does--on nights when we cry over
a story about a sorry daddy, the colors of my soon-to-be
new room, the reason the walls are blue and covered in sail
boats, still. One hand rubs me over, the other slides down
the side of mother's egg-white face: tilt a little more left,
and hug the belly-bottom...now smile and say:
"It's a girl!"
First and foremost, I would like to say that I thoroughly enjoyed reading your piece. It was filled with continuous concrete images such as "vicious cationic polymers," "con-artist denims," and "flake-like fingers." I almost feel as though I am the "retro photographer" because your images are powerful. I love how you improv by starting off similar to Meitner's piece and keeping the idea of a photographer; however, you branch off into your own original work and make it your own. I also noticed that you did your own format and left everything in one stanza which is different because the original poet wrote in 3 stanzas. The only suggestion I would offer is to perhaps do a contraction to make these images more powerful. I admire you for being able to effectively improv Meitner, as I found her to be quite difficult. Overall, I think this is a very good, effective piece.
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