trinity of poems
jonathan levant
1) my susan voice
equal pay for equal perversions
let out of his strong cage
pushed into a weak freedom of whim
jack kevorkian is key to this decade
2) getting the sunday funnies&a toy stove that day
my son is there I take a shower shoving up the
opaque glass to keep an eye on my son
I call out ot my wife “is travis still
in the backyard?” she’s in the kitchen
with a window out to the back; then “oh
I see him” I say and rinse when
I look out next he’s gone and the wife
has moved with our nine month old daughter
into a room that can’t see the back yard
I pull on my trunks and go to the play-
ground two busy streets away
and there’s travis on a slide I
take him by the hand and talk to him
about telling people where one will be
I phone and tell ginger we’ll be
at the playgournd; i’m proud&troubled
3) distressed&delighted//epilog
noah the author’s wife wonder should she
go to the party at hillary’s
it conflicts with the poetry
evening at her husband’s
which she has never attended
she doesn’t want to give
her gas money to hillary
she wants me to install
her air conditioner (for her
not for the baby/ies) I
won’t
4) diary may 15th 1995
the only thing I gave up for travis was my diary
and it was time for that to die anyways
it may have been coincidence
travis and I have mailed stuff off to twenty magazines
this month and one ltter to one real person
which was almost exactly like a submission
the submissionary position the easy jokes
and yet his repeated genuine delight at
asking why the chicken crossed the road
on the day my son planted a garden of 4-o’clocks
and I held the two babies (at bay) for an hour
