Kenny Knight

 
You sir, are a rogue & a liar: the trout
in beefheart's replica is, in fact, a carp.
 
Would you call me a cynic, Jane?
It was here that evaluation became most difficult.
Although they'd known each other for six months
they found they could still surprise each other in various ways.
 
The process of social discipline was not as yet disconnected.
Burt Ward is behind the bar on Sunday morning when I walk in.
The place smells of cooking - bacon & eggs. At such a moment
hunters gather in astonishing numbers. The Methodist tradition
here is mostly ambivalent. What could that mean? You will not like me.
God, Marissa interjected. You look like your jaw is unhinged
 
Pete was getting that funny look again,
the one I was becoming familiar with.
I was starting to feel a sort of vicarious pleasure
related to his new-found celebrity.
The gentlemen will be envious & the ladies will be repelled.
 
Without women, Helen realised, men do strange things.
Your mate, she said, that's not him, is it?
If you were here more often you'd realise that
we all sink into an abyss. An elegy to prey & predator.
 
A curious & most puzzling question might be stated
concerning the visual matter as touching the Leviathan.
Yeah, that's Pete, I said, & turned to him as if to establish
our friendship & also his identity.
 
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan?
Such examples, pluckt from scores readily to hand,
may convey the flavour of puns & wordplay
& I’ll love it. She made a noise deep in her throat
& the lava began to rise. A whale did that?
A whale as big as an island.
 
Valuable food like this will not go to waste
in the ocean. He took a deep breath & unhooked it,
carefully, referentially. He smiled uncertainly & sidled out
of the shop in a suitably enigmatic fashion.
 
The point of this game was to preserve the excitement of novelty.
Air guitar player wanted. Must be fit & possess own instrument.
 
If you consider the Steppenwolf from this standpoint,
it will be clear to us why he suffered so much under
his ludicrous dual personality. In an hour she was gone,
assuring me that it would go better next time.
 
Dwarfed by the vast expanse of the open ocean,
he called her every night & told her how much he missed her,
the biggest animal that ever lived on our planet,
how he liked her & just felt so natural & comfortable
with her.
 
Yet the ocean never rests. Huge currents such as the
gulf-stream keep its waters constantly on the move around
the globe. Here the Methodist tradition is ambivalent.
On the one hand, we sprawled in the boat, our legs
intertwined, & rubbed suntan lotion into each others skin.
Wet, drenched through & shivering cold, Methodist preachers
perfected techniques to arouse paroxysms of fear and death.
 
At night, strapped to our masts,
we listen to the wailing sirens.
& you'll wonder who could that have been
if not pirate jenny. The sheer quantity of marine life
the sea contains far exceeds that of the land.
 
Steve Spence