Red-Lipped Stranger

Red-Lipped Stranger

Her creep crawls
the narrow stairway
of the Candlelight Motel
to watch for her
from a window.

Rethinking
his infatuation
but clinging
to his vision of her
as the red lipped stranger.

Downstairs
the desk clerk's cat
slithers through
the service entrance.

The vampirate
on a motorbike
passes below
to the westbound bridge
werewolf on her back.

Jennifer at riverbend
watches gunboats
smacks her foot
on the bright red clay.

Jennifer gives good lyric
she wrote this poem
she's no bum.

But she's not there
on the other side
of the greenish wall.

Through a three-inch-wall
he hears
bedsprings rattle
rustle of dry-hump,
some guy's mumbles.

Hears the fat blonde waitress
whip it in bondage
the sounds
lull him to sleep.

The hand of Uncle Sugar
still taking notes
as a new standard bearer
hands out trophies
to the winners.

His trillion dollar gash
flakes from the bone
as gravity tears
a pound of dust.

Clings to a picture book
the missing part of himself
as if perpetually
anchored
to his invisible erection.

At Lucky Seven Lounge
she tries
not to reveal herself
but she stubbornly clutches
her empty shoes.

Something
seems missing
in the broad daylight
when the details
are displayed.

All that remains are
her flat black hat
her oversized lantern
her broken laptop.

No poor boy on the street
can speak of her
or the island on the river.
Or about her return...
her resurrection.

-Will Dockery