Monday, June 1, 2020

RYAN QUINN FLANAGAN


RYAN QUINN FLANAGAN

Duelling Pushkin

When Pushkin was not writing,
he apparently liked to duel.

Whether challenged and challenging others.
The combatants firing duelling pistols at each other
from 15-20 paces away.

Pushkin was as proficient a dueller
as he was a writer.

Amassing a record of 28-1.
It is however, that 1 that matters most.

His wife was a giant flirt,
which may explain much of this duelling
and it was her flirtations with a French officer
which lead to Pushkin being fatally shot
and mother Russia losing one
of her greats.

A man has to defend his honour.
Or so the story goes.
Those pistols so ornate,
works of art really.

But I’ll take the books, thanks!
Bettered by pistol, but never the page.









7th Floor Picnic

My wife spreads a blue blanket out over the bed.
She has used it as a pillow on the plane
and now it is to be the base of our 7th floor picnic.
To keep crumbs out of the bed.

I open the window to the street
as she slices into the baguette with a plastic knife
and opens the various meat and cheese packages.

Then we sit cross-legged on the bed
and build our sandwiches.
We are hungry and eat two each.
Chug a bunch of water after a long flight.

I can’t believe we are sitting in Paris
having a picnic on the bed!
she says.

I smile and she hugs me.
We stand by the window watching
the red light district pick up
as it gets dark.

Then we climb into bed
and listen to the sounds of the city.
So tired we don’t even open our eyes
when we speak.









Hitting Puberty

It wasn’t abuse at all
because he was hitting
puberty.

It was natural.
Like swings in a park.

The oils from his face
rubbed through horny
awkward fingers.

A stolen nudie mag
under the bed
to get him through
the tough times.









Da Palma Doesn’t like Car Chases

Everyone should have their biases,
they add to your character,
not the one you play, the other one…
the one you are said to have,
to have formed since you were a young child
and largely dependent of the biases of others,
hopefully your biases are yours and not just the old ones
hanging on like a loose tooth twisted sideways;
embrace you biases:
Da Palma doesn’t like car chases, finds them boring,
was never a big car guy, he’s a big Hitchcock guy
who could care less about cars…
And when his father started cheating on his mother,
he filmed the women coming and going;
film was his means of capturing his truth
in a way he could see it and translate
his prejudices into believable follies.








Happy Accident

He was on a bag of mushrooms
when he piled into a family of five
on their way home from a high school
football game.

Killed everyone on impact,
he escaped with minor cuts and bruises.

And when the cops dragged him away,
he could not stop laughing.

At all the tarps across the pavement
like Davie Crockett out of coonskin caps
and the hilarious way the arresting officer
kept saying the word attorney.


RYAN QUINN FLANAGAN


No comments :

Post a Comment