ABOUT

CONTENTS

EDITORIAL

ARCHIVE

LAGNIAPPE

MAST

SUBMISSIONS

Poem
by Dora Malech


WHERE BABIES COME FROM

She ditched the dignitaries at the arboretum,
puttyroot in a gunnysack, big bulb and all.
Shoulder to grow light, ducked

to where water was foam, final.
Slipped into something a little more shiftless.
Talked archaeopteryx. Slammed a mimosa.

Fingered malignant, then rigged
a slingshot at the quay, waggled sayonara
to spinster spitting cuticles into the bassinet,

spinster smuggling cigars in her girdle,
spinster who bled from her moustache on Sundays,
spinster who fondled the farsighted carhop,

ruined the solitaire deck in the sauna.
Sun dappled a brindled dog. Lifted hackles,
then back to licking its nethers and chops.

On a hunch she checked the lost-and-found,
dug up her first school frock and an eyelet punch.
Broke the flange, promised a lariat, saw a man

about his mother. Butts in the jack-o-lantern,
ash on the hassock. Arrivederci? You dare me?
Asked her back Thursday to scare him some more.