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TWO POEMS
by Kathryn Simmonds

With Zebra

1. Zebra

This time I'm slinging in a zebra.
I won't mention that bruised down-and-out beside the bridge,
the smile he gives as day turns into night,
the orange sky. It's all been done and like you said, it's kind of
overplayed. I need a zebra with a dust-shagged mane
and sooted snout. I'll have him wander graceful through the page.

2. Zebra Chez-moi

The zebra's made himself at home.
When I'm kicking back to MTV or flicking through my own
collected works, he's jiggling to get up on my knee.
Luckily he gets distracted easily - he likes to read about himself,
Google: zebra

and he's clicking on a pixelated stripe, summoning the plains of Africa,
trying to find chat rooms that will let him in.
I say my terrace isn't big enough for both of us -
he says too bad, reminds me I invited him
(weren't things too predictable,
my poems stored in boxes never accidentally squashed by hooves).

3. Zebra Lament

I'll admit I used him as a prop,
but how was I to know he'd start to muscle in.
Please, I want to go back to the down-and-out, the orange sky.
People have begun to stare, they're fascinated by the state we're in,
me and him, the just-for-Christmas zebra who won't leave.

My carpets stink. He's always on the internet. He says he's found
a new community, he's ditched the plains, the orange sky,
he says this time he's slinging in a man.



CORRECTION

I also lied about the therapy;
I lay back on a bench instead
and told my troubles to a drunk who stank
of stale cider and relieved me of my cigarettes.
I lied about my one good kidney
and the ballet lessons.
And the contraceptive pills.
I lied about my childhood in Somerset
where I learned the taste of crab apples and swam
like Esther Williams in a turquoise lake
modeling a costume splashed with orange sunflowers.
The Yew tree with Y branches is still waiting to grow
in the back garden I never knew
I have always believed in God and I do not speak Portuguese.
Cape Cod is a mystery to me.
You might be wondering about the man
who waited with me outside the tobacconist, his hand in mine until
the rain eased off.
But that is all beside the point and too late now.
There are other things we ought to get cleared up:
I never got beyond the shaving scene in Ulysses.
It was me who took the wheels off your car.
Your shoulders really are lopsided.