[Violent Pornography]

I'll write on you too.

Somewhere over the rainbow

Way up high

There's a land that I heard of

Once in a lullaby

Somewhere over the rainbow

*Skies are blue*

And the dreams that you dare to dream

Really do come true

Some day I'll wish upon a star

And wake up where the clouds are far behind me

Where troubles melt like lemondrops

Away above the chimney tops

That's where you'll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow

Bluebirds fly

Birds fly over the rainbow

Why then, oh why can't I?

Some day I'll wish upon a star

And wake up where the clouds are far behind me

Where troubles melt like lemondrops

Away above the chimney tops

That's where you'll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow

Bluebirds fly

Birds fly over the rainbow

Why then, oh why can't I?

If happy little bluebirds fly

Beyond the rainbow

Why, oh why can't I?

Sestina

September rain falls on the house.

In the failing light, the old grandmother

sits in the kitchen with the child

beside the Little Marvel Stove,

reading the jokes from the almanac,

laughing and talking to hide her tears.

She thinks that her equinoctial tears and the rain that beats on the roof of the house

were both foretold by the almanac,

but only known to a grandmother.

The iron kettle sings on the stove.

She cuts some bread and says to the child,

It's time for tea now; but the child

is watching the teakettle's small hard tears

dance like mad on the hot black stove,

the way the rain must dance on the house.

Tidying up, the old grandmother

hangs up the clever almanac

on its string. Birdlike, the almanac

hovers half open above the child,

hovers above the old grandmother

and her teacup full of dark brown tears.

She shivers and says she thinks the house

feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove.

It was to be, says the Marvel Stove.

I know what I know, says the almanac.

With crayons the child draws a rigid house

and a winding pathway. Then the child

puts in a man with buttons like tears

and shows it proudly to the grandmother.

But secretly, while the grandmother

busies herself about the stove,

the little moons fall down like tears

from between the pages of the almanac

into the flower bed the child

has carefully placed in the front of the house.

Time to plant tears, says the almanac.

The grandmother sings to the marvellous stove

and the child draws another inscrutable house.