Elis Regina, Águas de Março

Vagina Dentata

Eva Mudocci

Salome, Eve, The Madonna with a violin

Edvard's queen of ire and desire

Eva's steamy death image

sinister, nude, looking down at the viewer

Deadly seductive, framed in a line of spermatozoa
swimming from a skeletal fetus

Evangaline Hope Murdock

Italianized her English name 

Muse and lover of Munch

Posed for Henri

I would have loved to hear you play your violin

witnessing the lines of music entwining the audience,

like the strands of your endless, long dark hair

reaching out to ensnare.

Tentacles ever reaching

choking poor emotionally gridlocked Edvard

and the audience, leaving them to imagine.

They are spellbound by your myth

the artists, feminists, romanticists

Devil Woman, let me be…

Sexual power and evil

Ye are one and the same.

Debra Girard, July 7, 2011

A Christmas Grand Guignol in Prague

Two carp.

Two carp biting chunks out of each other

trapped in a small bath tub

Left there for days, ten to be exact,

to eliminate the muddy taste

that bottom feeders often have

Sweet meat for Christmas dinner.

Christmas was coming To Prague

The "Golden City"

that birthed Kafka, and The Golem

The city that Kafka once  called "The little mother with claws."

There was Pani Uteshena, my Ukrainian born landlady

I rented her deceased husband's library

in a sprawling Stalin-era apartment complex

painted in acres and acres of ochre

Mrs Uteshena, the little grandmother with claws

Christmas was coming to Prague.

I saw the signs:  the tubs of live carp

on each street corner.

At home in the U.S. we have over the top 

retina burning displays,
gaudy Christmas colors everywhere.

In Prague,  tubs of live carp.

Red holiday blood splatters the white snow- Ho ho ho!

A burly man will club a carp for you- CRACKKK!

Or you can take it home

and club it yourself

"People don't do that anymore" he said.

I was reassured that I wouldn't find

a surprise in the bathtub

Mrs. Uteshena, though, was a traditionalist.

So for ten reeking days I couldn't shower

Waiting for the day of the carp's reckoning

When the day finally came, I was ready

towel, soap and toothbrush in my hand,  

I waited for a sign

I listened for a sign

Then  a  WHAP! WHAP! WHAP! from behind the door.

I felt like Joan Blondell, who played the fat hooker

in the 60's shocker  film "Lady in a Cage"

when the hoodlums stabbed 

her wino buddy to death

behind the couch where she was seated.

Off-camera violence- WHAP! WHAP! WHAP!

I quickly went to the bath tub, 

rinsed off the remnants

of  the carps' brain and scales

left over from the profuse drubbing

and relished the warm water rushing over me.

Debra Girard, July 8, 2011

   

Motion or an Imagined Conversation to a Friend Who Has Asperger's

Yeah I always felt like the odd duck.  My teacher's would write in my report cards

about how they couldn't

reach me-

I was in another world

that I never responded to them

in a way that they were accustomed

had thrown up their hands long ago.  

Kids get it- they know something is strange about you.  

My mother used to tell me that when I was a baby

I would rock repetitively in my crib for hours.

I think I just liked the motion. 

When the car stopped I would start screaming

until the car moved again.

I was also like a sack of flour when she held me

That's what she was fond of saying

But I cried when I saw "Bambi"...

by Debra Girard, April 22, 2011

Catbird

 D L Girard, July 5, 2011

"You can stay"

So D. found a spot to roost

wildly turning his head

from side to side, not unlike a praying mantis

when it eyes its prey

flapping his arms

punctuating his sentences with

"Wowww, maaan!"

So he stayed and

Regaled us with stories of his travels

across the states,

His deals, his near escapes

comically flapping his arms all the while

He introduced us to hashish

laced with what is erroneously called angel dust

Starting to panic, my heart pounding in my ears

the telltale heart, 

revealing my paranoia, my panic

To prevent a stir,

I busied myself by cooking sopapillas, sofapillas all night

The puffy bits of fried dough

permeating my clothes along with burnt Crisco

At one of our many impromptu parties

he brought some "friends"

one pasty, jerking and hopping

the junkie's jig

disappearing with D., then reappearing

on our sofa gloriously sated

I knew.  I had  Cathode Ray images of "The Man With the Golden Arm"

flashing in my fourteen year old head.

One day D. flew, presumably

back to De Moines

back to where my ancestors lived for generations

back to my mother's home town

She knew his family-small  world!

leaving me wondering

if he finally found his own nest
leaving room for another to take his place.

Video courtesy of MC Jungle Paul.

The Guardians

At the end of the day, the end of the day

they arrive

The shadows guarding their stake

At the end of the day

She screamed herself 

into exhaustion 

Sometimes from a failed disciplinary action 

doing the opposite of what it was supposed to do

The shadows make such a clamor

their voices cracking, adolescent

At the end of the day

their cursive lettering carefully guarded

No one is going to fuck with their mark

At the end of the day

The guardian shadows take their posts, Imbibe, trash talk

Bust each other's balls

The boredom makes them edgy

By Debra Girard, July 3, 2011

Spraying

Evidence is everywhere

painted in letters

that look like extra terrestrial cursive

lines over lines

I wish I had that hand

such swirls of paint

I wish I could piss

like a dog or cat

proclaiming my height, gender, 

position in life

my readiness to mate.

How would others read it?

She's powerful,

she's horny,

she's mean, avoid her,

court her, she's fertile, and can give you  

a strong genetic line.

My emotional, genetic, pheromonal state

sprayed on the bushes,

fences, gates, sidewalks, and trees.

by Debra Girard, June 30, 2011