STEVE PRICE

EXPIRATION DATES

My mother naps on the couch,

I skim Portrait of a Lady.

All the verbs and characters

are passive. As am I.

I haven’t done one thing

my entire life.

I go to the pantry

and start throwing out

the salad dressings.

She shuffles up behind me.

Look at this, I tell her.

AUG 74.  FEB 73.  JAN 72.

This stuff has been sitting here

since I was nine years old!

I open a Thousand Island.

It smells like silverware polish.

She dips her pinky, tastes it.

It’s perfectly good, she says.

Those dates don’t mean anything.

BILLY FRENCH

 

Armpit hair in third grade.
 

Fucked Linda Frankel’s mother
(Linda’s pussy: too small).
Chased by Mr. F thru the cemetery,
ended up splitting a six.
 

Partied with the Charlie Daniels Band.
 

Told Mr. Avelli to bite him,
said he’ll come to class stoned if he feels like it.
That he’ll always be stoned,
ninety years old, rocking on his porch,
smoking a doobereeno.
 

7th grade, grew a beard
(vs. shaving twice a day).
 

His mother: never home.
Made himself Steak ’Em sandwiches.
Ate them in front of us. Lots of ketchup.
 

Set the fat little son of a bitch on fire.
 

Fucked Cher at the Concord
after she & Sonny had a fight.
 

Stationed in Texas,
rolled his jeep. Headstone:
see ya down there

TONIGHT, CARL BORROWS A FIRE ENGINE
TO WOO DARLENE EVANS
 

Circling St. Mary’s Park wailing

like a lovesick monster.

And her, perched on the bench,

giving him the finger,

her regular scared off

by the tail of patrol cars.

Ghosts come running

out of the old bordellos:

Eliza Traver, robe open.

Ma Best, bankbook flapping.

Sully, nightstick limp. . . .

Something’s burning;

what, nobody knows.

Steve Price grew up in Hudson, NY, a town known historically for whale processing and prostitution. These poems are from his collection in progress entitled, HENRY HUDSON WASN'T HERE.