Four Poems [by Mitch Sisskind]

The Great Tweed

 

He was called the Great Tweed because

A Tweed was a perfectly attired student

And he was great at it so he was called

The Great Tweed. Once in a while men

From NYC advertising agencies would

Visit the university looking for models

And mostly they picked athletes but

When they saw the Great Tweed they

Put him in Esquire. Okay last night

Upon suddenly awakening I flashed

A so-vivid image of the Great Tweed

Circa 1965 in the elevator of our

Embarrassingly rundown Columbia

Dormitory and I even remembered

The Great Tweed's name although

I had never spoken to him which

Caused me to wonder if perhaps he

He had died at that moment but

When I Googled him I learned he's

A retired brain surgeon in Florida.

My takeaway? Though starlings fly

By night in their sidereal thousands

Their murmuration is a single voice.

 

 

At the Valvoline Place

 

At the Valvoline oil changing place

I introduce myself as the oldest man

In the world and I ask the young man

What is the most miles he has seen

On a car here at the Valvoline place.

He says about four hundred thousand

But I scoff at that and say how my car

Already has two hundred twenty-five

Thousand and it will easily make

Four hundred thousand except I might

Not be there to see it in as much as

I'm already the oldest man in the

World and he asks how old are you

And I say I am two million and ten.

 

 

Smolarek

 

Smolarek. You know that name.

When Smolarek said swimming

Gets the crud out of your pores

You listened and listened good.

Same way as when Smolarek

Went to jail and when he got out

He said it was like Barnum & Bailey

In there. Why was Smolarek in jail?

He was talking to the female police

Officer whereupon the male officer

Horned in. What did Smolarek do?

Same as you would have done!

Exact same thing as Smolarek did

Is what you would have done too!

 

 

Hurricane

 

Now is this what you expected?

Mist or a fog-like moisture lasting

An hour or so and then creepily

Gaining intensity without you even

Registering it until a steady rain

Falls in the suspiciously still air.

 

I say 'suspiciously' because the

Stillness is in fact an unstable

Equilibrium that slowly and then

Suddenly explodes into a monster

Simulacrum of itself as though

In some demonic funhouse mirror.

 

I say 'demonic' because of your

Tendency to anthropomorphize

A meteorological phenomenon

Into some divine judgment now

Sternly rendered on all your

Boneheaded financial blunders

 

And your dread of making a

Fool of yourself in the bedroom,

The boardroom, the bathroom,

The barnyard, the beauty shop,

The battlefield, or behind the

The wheel of your automobile

 

And when the hurricane blows

All of that away you will go

Oh wow. You will go oh wow

Again and again. You will just

Keep going oh wow, oh wow,

Over and over, just oh wow.

 

Ed. note: Click here for Sisskind's interview with Michael Silverblatt, host of "Bookworm."
https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/bookworm/mitch-sisskind-collected-poems-2005-2020

Comments

[clarinda harriss]

Oh wow. Had to say it. Meant it sincerely. (Resonates particularly with me since I am in fact the oldest woman in the world. Born in 1939 BC. I particularly like the deceptive simplicity. The rhetoric of these poems is classic.--cl

[Warren King]

Wow is right.