Ester Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Ester

Monday, February 20,2017
3: 13 PM

The sea besides the castle shook for her
And I drank a lot.
The pilots sang for their mermaids. They took
Their planes diving for her,
And their passengers turned green,
Singing and holding their breath for her-

The sky spumed, the clouds ejaculating as fireworks-
They were showing off for her-
As the last of the titans kidnapped stewardesses from
Airplanes and married them:

I told my children bedtime stories about her,
Just as my father told me stories about the feral boys
Raised by the badgers themselves trained by her:

By the age of twelve, I sold fireworks in Miami for
My father
Who himself was working entirely in servitude for her.
-
In the mirages of daylight,
Along the franchised strip,
The streets sweated for her, turning into teenagers
Who committed suicides for her-
And I called her up and I hopped on stage for her:

I sold for her- naked
Before the stars and dinosaurs,
Barefooted in the strawberry fields,
She stepped down from the castle:

A muse on a geometric waterfall besides the watermelons
And the centipedes
And the narcoleptic unicorns-

The shaggy man covered in locks of blonde crawled
Out from beneath the courtyard of that old high-school
And danced in courtship of her

I ran away from home and achieved the highest
Scores in the arcades for her:
I ran all night for her,
Past the nocturnal graveyards and the all night drive in
Movie theatres for her-

I smelled her sweat pattered like the homeopathy
Of the coldest holidays, as chameleons shed their
Technicolor skins in the daylights on the popcorn rocks
For her-

And turned into a cenotaph in homage hunting in
The waves for her-

I saw her today. The prettiest thing from Haiti.
34 years old, building a trailer to sell things in underneath
The bridges. She spent $150 dollars on me
And laughed and talked about a thousand false things
Before she went away and I started once again
To mind my own business-

And now that I am done- and it is a holiday: President's
Day-
During these hopeless hours theyoung queens of Mexico are being
Sent home to be re united with the graves of their grandmothers-
I can lie down underneath of a highway and pretend it is
A beautiful meadow:

And with my eyes closed, I hear my son say that you are perfect
And I know that he too is talking about her.