A N D T H E W O R L D
S H O U L D N O T T H I N K
Y O U R C H E R R Y .
BY ELIZABETH HILDRETH
- - - -
I would have said go, but I am gone.
Even with weasel and room and board,
even with your sly reptile cherry
floating oh to the top of the sea,
it was not so interesting, new,
or even ugly. It was just grass.
It was your hair where we smoked your grass
out, where you fled scarecrow and were gone
to Indiana like bastard New-
foundland, like CAN-UH-DUH. Hell. I'm bored
again. When you look at me, you see
my mind: a big fat nasty cherry.
And the world should not think your cherry.
And the world should not smoke out your grass.
And when you look at me, you should see
some skin at least. Otherwise I'm gone
and the bones of the night are just board-
ed at a martini bar, like new-
ly drugged stars. Look, the library New-
bury has a book with a cherry
spine and a picture of you onboard
sinking like a daffodil in grass.
I didn't tell you go, so how gone
are you if I didn't say I'll see
you later? I can taste the salt sea
that is deep inside your übernew
drawers swimming higher than the dragon
tree full of pickle, pear, and cherry.
Inside your legs is green with stuck grass,
light as a feather, stiff as a board.
The wild animal that kept us bored
a hole so deep you could clearly see
the other side of the Earth's green grass.
Only it was gold and carved from nu-
bile Currin's wife. The blades were cherry
on the inside where madness was gone.
Where I am not Günter Grass, I am bored,
you are gone. As far as I can see
it's all new, but it's never cherry.
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