United States, (b. 1946)
Calliope
- When she used the word bullnose to describe
- The blunt corner of a marble kitchen counter –
- From that moment I was in love with Calliope
- Because I saw a knowledge of carpentry which,
- Although I had been unaware of it, I do find
- Attractive in a woman whose slender arms
- Disguise wiry strength just as her vocabulary
- Unexpectedly includes a word like bullnose.
- Another turn-on for me is a sylph-like woman
- In a form-fitting wedding dress and therefore
- I anticipate browsing Modern Brides magazine
- With Calliope – notwithstanding how when I
- Looked up bullnose in the dictionary it was
- Defined as a disease of pigs. But no matter!
The Girls Began Speaking Pig Latin
- When the girls began speaking Pig Latin
- On the school bus I saw the pleasure
- Women discover in a secret language
- And more importantly I understood how
- Learning Pig Latin could be a shibboleth
- Opening the door to love! Yes, love,
- Whereas sex such as it was existed
- Only as the Playboy pictures furtively
- Hidden under a mattress until one day
- Torn up and flushed down the toilet for
- The awful shame of it. Ethay answeryay
- Asway igpay atinlay andyay ohyay odgay
- Iyay iedtray. Oh God, I’ve tried but I failed,
- Andyay isyay ityay ownay ootay atelay?
About the Poet:
Mitch Sisskind, United States, (b. 1946), Sisskind is a poet, a short fiction writer, a guest lecturer and a ghost writer of sixty books. A spiritual person, Sisskind finds cosmological joy in the human enterprise. He discusses writing humorous poetry and his new book, Collected Poems 2005-2020 (2020). And he shares stories from being a student in the first class Kenneth Koch ever taught.
He edited The Stud Duck and has worked on such literary magazines as Columbia Review and Living Hand. He is also the author of numerous poems, including the one-line poem “Dance on, you pigs! I will never get used to it” that appeared under fourteen different titles in Janet Benderman.
Two books of his short fiction have been published: Visitations (1984), Dog Man Stories (1993) and also poetry in Do Not Be a Gentleman When You Say Goodnight (2016). His poems were included in The Best American Poetry anthologies for 2009 and 2013. [DES-0122]
Additional information:
- This is Mitch Sisskind’s Typepad Profile