I am a transactional man.
I barter a business suit for the slight tickle between the rooster’s legs.
I walk with brisk precision.
As I would at The Bourse.
Hammer-head feet cutting the deck of granular sands.
Scattered into the bosom cracks of tattooed princesses.
Tubular blossomed foxgloves like pink scrolls
Spiraling down alabaster arms.
Tortoises turning lazy shells.
I have stepped into the pop up shop of crayola sunglasses—white and orange, blue and red!
I fit the cool waters of the Willamette
Into the typology of the fastidious sea captain:
I note the barge from China heading east ten-stories tall.
Full of contraband stowed away in pallets
Stacked like the blight of Chengdu skyscrapers.
A blissed-out bald and bountiful father
Slugging back Pabst
Through a gas mask.
The rubbery floating dragon.
A donut hole of helium.
Wide enough to fit his cumbersome ass.
A militia maniac with a POW flag
Staring like Commodore Perry
On a tugboat from a war that does not need him anymore.
[I intend to note this man in my will].
Dry winds glide past a crooked face
Battling the muted bagpiper of faded joys.
Clouds, a pair of stinking shoes.
Sun, the wonder ball of greed.
Kite, the shape of a heart, unwound by the jaundiced, spindly veteran of free love communes—
Just a few more steps to fling the soapy suds of high tide.
The maternal womb of the liquid god.
Chest hairs dancing the white foam.
After the clip-clop of the wet donkey trot—
Boardwalk of scattered flip flops.
Read Jason’s essay about the pleasures of ice cream, even on cold days.