The Merchant

By Larry Eby

The Merchant

There are hieroglyphs in the sandbox,
pigeon shit dripping down the wood fence.
There anything left in that stomach of yours?

An apple dumpling, maybe.
Some battery acid.

All rings of coins to me.
Rats bite off their tails,
leave their ribcages on windowsills.

 

The Gardener

She names the crystal balls
lined up on the porch swing.
Carpet, Meat, Vodka, Skin…

They’re like jars of children
that met the silver hook.

Then there’s Sunshine!
She rubs her temples at the kitchen table,
sucks her tongue into her throat.

 

The Librarian

She throws rocks through spiderwebs.
Laughs about it. Tells me to solder them back together.
metal conduit; guess what’s inside

Egg fountain.
Felines licking glass.

Just air, fucker.
Hard-water mineral underneath my fingernails.
I stripe the rock with yolk.

 

Larry Eby writes from Southern California where he plans to earn his MFA in Poetry from CSUSB. His work has appeared in the Sand Canyon Review, Inlandia, Welter, Badlands, Aperçus Quarterly, The Redlands Review, and Call of the Wild: Being Human, as well as others. He is an active member of PoetrIE, an Inland Empire based literary community, and owner of Orange Monkey Publishing Company.

 

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