George Starbuck

C O S T

To a Real Standup Piece of Painted Crockery

I wonder what the Greeks kept in these comicstrip canisters.
Plums, milletseed, incense, henna, oregano.
Speak to me, trove. Tell me you contained dried smoked tongue once.
Or a sorcerer or a cosmetologist’ s powders and unguents.
And when John Keats looked at you in a collection of pots
it was poetry at first sight: quotable beautiful
teleological concatenations of thoughts.

Translations from the English

Pigfoot (with Aces Under) Passes

The heat’ s on the hooker.
Drop’ s on the lam.
Cops got Booker.
Who give a damn?

The Kid’ s been had
But not me yet.
Dad’ s in his pad.
No sweat.

Margaret Are You Drug

Cool it Mag.
Sure it’ s a drag
With all that green flaked out.
Next thing you know they’ ll be changing the color of bread.