what happens when you throw a yellow rock
into a purple stream?
i don't know.
so i asked old billy knowles,
the moonshine genius of nugent farms.
a burst of raw grapefruit spits around your head like cocaine fingers
on a spinning wheel
before my brain exploded
i said goodbye to old billy knowles,
caught the high-noon train to lake shore
where aunt middy-may can be found
writing sonnets in dog blood.
what happens when you throw a yellow rock
into a purple stream?
christ our gentle lord removes the stain of three-chord blues
from our humble lives
leaving lake shore i decided
the answer could be downtown
at jakes jelly saloon.
growing out of the maple bar,
low-tide larry,
vodka priest of the local clam flats.
what happens when you throw a yellow rock
into a purple stream?
ain't about the colors, son. it's about the splash. my advice, stop eating
crayons
“Riddance to Riddles” was printed in Esther, No. 1 of Inwood Indiana. Pick up the paperback from Prolific Press; the stories and poems published online are free to read here.
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