PoetryRepairShop MM.12:141

DIANE PAYNE BEFORE THE PHONE GOES DEAD in PoetryRepairShop MM.12:141

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MM.12:141

DIANE PAYNE
BEFORE THE PHONE GOES DEAD

I answer the phone and listen
to a woman ramble on about
how she has locked her
keys in the car
and nothing is going right.
"I know this is the wrong number
and I'm in this dark parking lot."
Then the phone goes dead
and I'm left wondering if
I should trace the call,
notify the police,
or simply finish reading
my daughter her books before bed.

Phone rings in the middle of the night
and I must decide whether to answer it
or wait until morning to see who has died.
I pick up the receiver but say nothing.
"Pendejo! ¿Sabes quien es?" he laughs.
I have no idea who he is and remain quiet.
"La cagamos," he continues.
"Portate bien," I say before the phone goes dead,
hoping he'll believe he's called his mother by mistake.

On a hot afternoon the phone rings
and a man begins talking about how there's
only four hundred more miles to drive
and everything will be fine this time.
He's sorry about what has happened
and is certain it won't happen again.
"Baby, I can't wait to see you.
Baby, why aren't you saying anything?"
"I think you have the wrong number."
"Quit clowning, Baby."
"I'm not."
Then the phone goes dead.

Poem, © 2000, DIANE PAYNE
(all rights reserved; To copy or translate this poem, please contact the poet)
Site design, © 2000, John Horvath Jr., PoetryRepairShop. and www.poetryrepairs.com (All Rights Reserved).
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DIANE PAYNE Introduces JOE FARMER
Thirsty

I
The chemical composition of a pregnant woman's
amniotic fluid is exactly the same
as that of sea water.

When I cry
the lonesome tears of a man
who has never been to the ocean

II
I was never breast-fed,
therefore, I am always thirsty
My throat is parched and caked with phlegm

I cling to coke bottles,
breast-shaped canteens
But you just can't beat the real thing.

III
Christ said, "Whosoever drinketh of the water
that I shall give him shall never thirst, but
the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well
of water springing up into everlasting life."

That's what I ‘m talkin' about.
Living water, the kind you cannot bottle
at the Coca-Cola plant.

IV
It's funny, they have a name
for the jelly-like stuff in people's eyes
("Vitreous Humor," in case your wondering) but
when a women is enticed to the point of Le'petit Mort

and the bittersweet juices begin to flow
(rolling down her thighs and into my mouth)
a combination, mostly of mucous and urine
that holy fluid remains nameless.

V
Drink plenty of fluids, 8 glasses of water
a day is not enough
The really fun things to do in life are the things
that totally drain you

and dry, dry is bad:
dry rot, dry mouth, dry county my ass.
So it becomes then, or the utmost importance
that you always keep yourself hydrated.

DIANE PAYNE Introduces JOE FARMER Thirsty

DIANE PAYNE Introduces JOE FARMER
Thirsty