Winter 2005 vol 4.2
 
 
 
 
 
Selected Poems
Mary A. Koncel
If the Inappropriate Dog Sleeps on a Grave

It’s always the littlest grave. The freshly dug one. The one just narrow enough for the last little boy. The inappropriate dog runs, sniffs across rutted potato fields and gravel roads. On brittle nights, on nights when reluctant trees hunker back to back, unadorned. Circling, panting wide-mouthed, the inappropriate dog will find it, lie down, curling nose to tail before beginning the dream that should every dog should dream. The boy in a striped yellow shirt. The boy with a handful of raspberries, blonde hair and his good, good dog beside him.


If the Inappropriate Dog Bites a Clown

Who will care? Who will bother to watch him chase the clown, ears flapping like furry wings, howling down the boulevard, around the fountain of coupling angels with their stubby glazed toes. Blame a history—one part flaming hula-hoops, three parts scorched red butts and testicles. The inappropriate dog can only take so much. He’s on the scent of vengeance. He’s catching up, just a nip or two away. See the clown run. See the clown tumble down the veranda. Hear the thump of clown feet, the thud of clown head. Now who will ask all the ruby-faced children and angels to please, please stand up and stare?