---

 

This writing was accepted for publication in the 108 page perfect-bound ISSN# / ISBN# issue/book “a Mad Escape” cc&d (v255) (the May/June 2015 22 year anniversary issue) You can also order this 6"x9" issue as a paperback book:

Order this writing in the book Salvation (issues edition) the cc&d Jan. - June 2015 collection book		get the 318 page Jan. - June 2015 cc&d magazine issue collection 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

Order this writing in the book Salvation (issues / chapbooks edition) - the cc&d Jan. - June 2015 collection book		get the 410 page Jan. - June 2015 cc&d magazine issue collection 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

Order this writing in the book Sunlight in the Sanctuary (the 2015 poetry, flash fiction, prose & artwork anthology)		get this poem collection 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

R. Nixon Toes the Line in the White House Bowling Alley

Alan Catlin

His form is questionable:
the black fifteen pound ball held
high against his chest in his
right hand, cradled by the left
as he stares down the under-
ground alley toward the pins.
If this is relaxation, he is as
awkward in sport, off-hours, as
he is on the job, on TV addressing
the nation as the elected leader
claiming a stack of recently
discovered audio tapes will
vindicate all his claims of
innocence to wrong doing,
malfeasance, high crimes and
misdemeanors, a claim almost
as incredible and as ludicrous as
the vanity in having made these
tapes at all; certainly his place in
history is already more than assured.
If vanity were the worst failure of
his character, the manner in which
he dressed himself is not an expression
of that fault: off-the-rack trousers
belted way too high above the waist,
an unflattering, tasteless t-shirt more
likely to be found in a fire sale,
bargain basement, than in a designer
showroom, all incredibly out of style.
Even the decorating scheme, the walls
in the alley where he is poised, toes
squarely on the third and fourth dots
along the suggested line, just this side
of the lighted one for recording fouls,
suggest early East Jersey cocktail lounge
circa 1966, though he can hardly be held
accountable for that lapse in taste.
No this leader of the free world,
R. Nixon, former political-persona-non-grata,
dead-man-walking, is about to release,
to drop the black weight from his hands,
to propel it as hard as he can down that
slick, that slippery well-oiled path toward
a stationery target, firing for effect; whether
the shot is a perfect strike, a well-aimed
missile is nowhere recorded; only the spooks,
special agents, soldiers sworn to secrecy know.

Copyright of written pieces remain with the author, who has allowed it to be shown through Scars Publications and Design.Web site © Scars Publications and Design. All rights reserved. No material may be reprinted without express permission from the author.

Problems with this page? Then deal with it...