White Cargo

American Poetry Review, The, Jan/Feb 2001 by Martin, Carl

As the adverse account shoos flies

There are still remnants of the dynastic fan.

Golf balls are tinder in the muzzle of art.

Camels like glittering ashtrays in the barber's mirror

Sink to their knees with domino teeth:

An advert for a fleshy deck of cards. Only

A straight razor separates hell from marriage.

And if camels are marriageable they adorn

The stem of this ancient bateau-citerne: The captain

Smiling like a mule. How fitting for the French coast!

Noel, old boy, pass the oxygen-would you?

CARL MARTIN is a MacDowell Fellow and has had poems in Rhizome, Ribot, and Combo. His first book, Go Your Stations, Girl, was published by Arion Press (San Francisco). His recent book of poetry, Genii Over Salzburg, was published by Dalkey Archive Press (University of Illinois).