Kitchen And Living Room Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

Do you see the desert
crawling in
with tornadoes of dust
on the space between

our undulating rolling couch
floating us
on a river carrying the canoe

in which we foam
by a jagged mountainside,

a wobbling staircase
and the tumbling door to the kitchen?

Breeze from a bubbling breath
tosses me,
a wind-drifted dry leaf,
up the horseback of shifting air.

A zephyr from your breath
taps me with butterflies
strokes me with blowing-mouth tassels
from hanging shifting corn cobs -

with flying cotton specks
placing baby palms
and oscillating moth fingers
on the eroded cornfield
on a hill's face below settling clouds.

(II)

No more flying lanes
through furrows of a wisecrack-lit
smile, a chuckle
and ajerky cough

warming up a boffola
to take the baton
for a ride back to the living room.

Parched stones on the doorway
have gobbled down
the gripping rug.

Heavy steps
from rock
and sandbag legs
slide on foam-wheeled pads.

Between cauldrons simmering
the broth that will keep us warm,
lilies and fire ginger
drop from your garden cheeks.

(iii)

The earthenware pots
smoke heavy pipes,
puffing out mist, lavender sheets

wrapping us up
insheets of a starry sky.

Blowing itself out
to the powdered flesh
of a new moon over a desert.

From the bony hands
of a torn couch,

we bounce and float
on a piano bench
pulling our ears
like leather patches of slingshots

to fling us off, pebbles of love,
to the shore,

a wave rubbing a tired
breaking bank
with thebobbing fingers
of a crawling wind.