STYLE RITUALS OF PURGATORY

PETER MARRA

======

(The devil dolls were singing

about Françoise Dorleac lying amongst the midnight

flowers fondling her memories

after the Renault pyre.)

-

She and I hid in our room

we watched as

her face described sumptuous

polychromed interiors where

she had reveled in public disgrace.

-

She made a statement:

“I have a surprise for you!”

-

(“We’re not going to leave this room at all, are we?”)

-

A faraway voice begs:

“Make a sacrifice: a halo or a disembodied heart.”

-

Symmetry will be

a desire we no longer need:

a woman’s torso bent, slightly warm.

-

We watch each other

while she watches us;

always a caustic comment etched in plaster,

crackling with sensibility.

-

(Vandals were guilty:

wanton, wide open, oversexed,

and they took photographs, while speaking of

the functions of a verb.)

-

Leaking fluid out of a warm window,

into a cul-de-sac

always licking puddles,

shot from behind. She smiles.

A drool.

-

She will sit and warm

herself with the fire

from the pews.

-

(She licks quivering lips as

female bats discuss flight.)

-

These wounds seem right

as a door of significance.

She left them to be entered and catalogued

in the museum collection,

-

we strolled outside,

feeling so relaxed

and slept in the grass,

-

while listening to the passionate moans

that were emitted from the practitioners

that are attracted to

the current social order.

“Make a sacrifice: a halo or a tarot card.”

-

The snow, slight and cold,

opened her eyes:

-

A specific reflex. A pure form

devoid of people.

-

Her silver cluster became the air

as we needed and we removed

desires with a higher image

this was in their design

-

a trip to sin island for

a sticky, brown paste,

enjoying the morphine curves

of any woman’s body

an empty feeling

it was almost destruction

the TV ordered us

instructions stuttered reminiscing about

those prescription days.

-

She stopped filling that

prescription days ago

images sliding in

a shooting gallery

sulfur and smoke

so much that she has trouble breathing.

-

(Wheeze.)

-

Needles dancing

the overhead fluorescent

has a smell of skin

those prescription days

she strokes her fur

feeling the shock

something new for her fingers

-

a tingle

a magic number

on a gurney sliding

a treacherous dance

at the end of the white hall

the tiny people are waiting

descending horns slowing down

she touches time’s spiked collar

something new for her fingers

-

a yen

for a pain exercise around the corner

-

watching

waiting

watching

-

further information:

a

dog

barking

-

to stop the transmission we opted to walk

she cried because she was stammering.

======

Peter Marra lives in Williamsburg Brooklyn. Among his many influences are Arthur Rimbaud, Tristan Tzara, Paul Eluard, European art films, Edgar Allan Poe, Russ Meyer, and Roger Corman.
He has been published in amphibi.us, Yes,Poetry, Maintenant 4, Beatnik, Crash, Danse Macabre, Caper Literary Journal, and Clutching At Straws. He is working on his first collection of poems.