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Alex Apples Aug 2010
He met her at a bar
in San Pellegrino
Yeah, like the water
but there was more wine
than water there

She was flicking a guitar
that she called "Bambino"
Her papa taught her
but she wasn't the kind
so easy to share

They slept inside his car
outside an old casino
The nights were hotter
than he'd ever find
anywhere

He said she'd be a star
but what the hell did he know?
**** gypsy daughter
broke into his mind
then left him there

She could only go so far
on his euros incognito
The polizia caught her
the guitar left behind
she'd tied him to a chair

She'd emptied out his jar
and his last good cigarillo
Shouldn't a brought her
she's serving time
Bambino in his care

He met her in a bar
in San Pellegrino
He said she'd be a star
what the hell did he know?
Nat Lipstadt Jun 2016
~

<>


nearby distant,
the soft thrash of warm waves
lapping interlocking,
happily wet tongue kissing,
sun-oven precision-crisping
the Long Island striped bass
and porgies, at a surreal cooling
77 degrees

Pandora synced to his eyes,
shuffling freely,
by saying
we too see!!
playing for him,
Stairway to Heaven (Led Zeppelin)

poor, poor poet,
strains to brain drain one more time,
conducting an ogling googling word search
for those combinatory storied ones that
sailboat glide
all the while
wildly bursting with Pellegrino effervescence

compromising sounds sights,
to present
properly the balance,
to preserve
properly this moment,
peaceful alive for all times,
as poet has tried,
and failed so many times before...

the caw caw caw of the crow mocks the illiterate human,
for the bird calls it, in single sound perfect and
the human a laughingstock,
for not in his possess,
to capture this perfect moment
of human sabbath.

a Roman Saturn day of rest,
on this day that itself,
is perfection,
perfect for celebrating our common creation,
on a day that our
almost-all-agreed-upon calendar
is marked for us to
forte rest,
from an existence of just laborious

the chubby checkered cheeked squirrels
laughingly pauses,
watching, enjoying a poet's struggle,
mind boggle,
the poet's chubby cheeks
stuffed with discarded words,
all insufficient to capture
the absolution of
absolute beauty

bathing in the noisiest of nature's sounds,
all that contravene the silence of living things,
breathing prayerful thoughts that all
summary end,
with a common gesture of
forefinger upon the lips

a human acknowledgment of
utter obeisance to the forces
calling out by example

listen, see!

silently presenting,
this,
this!!


a day that demanded perfection
Alyssa Starnes Jan 2011
Drinking Pellegrino thinking that if I had nicer sneakers I would run all the way across the state line without stopping and straight into your bed where we could talk about the donuts we were going to get at five the next morning, while I kissed your soft shoulders and you would tell me again that I was endless.
My own thoughts.
Omnis Atrum Mar 2015
I told you that I had no choice but to love you
and you smiled and nodded as if you were giving in to the thought,
but your eyes brightened and your mouth contorted
into the smirk that you give me when you're quite certain
either someone offered me thirty silver to say it
or I'm full of ****.

I lacked a taste for coffee when I was young.
Patience was a commodity in short supply,
and the few times I had tried to drink it
I found nothing but pain and bitterness in the beverage.
Yet, every time you came you brought it with you
and you brewed it with so much care
that I did not have the heart to tell you
how difficult it was for me to drink it.
Did I never tell you how you always forgot
to turn off the machine when you left?
I would follow behind you and switch it off ,
after you departed,
because you were too busy to stay
and drink what you had so effortlessly made.
I think my hands were too rough for the machine you used,
and when I broke the machine,
it continued to trickle slowly.
I knew how much it meant to you
so I did everything that I could to keep it off the floor.
Teacups and coffee mugs and plastic cups were the first to be filled
followed by punch bowls and baking dishes and iron pots.
It still dripped slowly and I started to panic
when the bathtub and the washing machine both started to overflow.

In those years I had become a sprinter
yelling at the masses to keep up during a charity marathon.
How many women delighted
in the seemingly endless supply of coffee that I brought to them?
It was often lukewarm at best,
and tasted nothing like when you had first brewed it,
but few will complain about the taste of a free drink when they thirst.
While they delighted in coffee I drank San Pellegrino in a glass
and the most sanguine sangria when I thought no one was watching.
Who was I to think them less evolved for not knowing the difference?
It is hard to keep sight of a finish line so far away
when the thought never leaves your mind
that if you ever stop sprinting and  you fall behind
you might return home to find it submerged.

I did not stop running until I could no longer breathe.
When I woke up I was sitting in the same house
that you used to brew coffee in while we visited.
I did not know what else to do,
and so I started pouring the coffee out.
I could not slow down once I had started.
Gallon after gallon poured out
and it rushed down the drain so willingly
that I wondered what stake gravity had in the matter.
I took the time to learn how the machine had been broken,
and with effort I repaired it so that it no longer trickled.

You still brew coffee every time that you come to visit,
but you brew it with so much care
that I have learned the patience to drink it slowly.
What choice did I ever have but to learn to drink it?
Did I never tell you how you always forget
to turn the machine off when you leave?
Mateuš Conrad Aug 2018
oops...
  there's really an oops,
with a follow up sentence?!

****....

  sam cooke,
              roy orbison...
   when did
frank zappa not become
    the next
roberto, Dylan,
and half the Disneyland?
tommy pet the zoo...

gone with the ****...
petty grievances
of the worthlessness
  of ego, in concet;
i hasten to abhor mineral
water that's not
                 fizzy enough...
Perrier, carbonated water?
      anything else?
san pellegrino...
  anything else?
like a prog rock record
                               bonanza....
                          i.e.
have a
of an hour to spare me,
to become the next
Richie Branson?!

              let#'s face it...
what was and what wasn't
Tubular Bells,
    by mike oldfield to
the enterprise?!

    zilch.... nothing...
                 i scratch my beard
and start thinking
about freshly baked bread...
and then i return to
the fetish of shaving off
the stubble.

came the Canterbury scene...
   with the, plethora of acts...
            and...

it's the same question,
rather, less the rolling stones
"vs." the beatles...
             given the song
solitude" by black sabbath...
  and led zeppelin's
                   *living loving maid
...

hmm...
frank zappa...
   i hate myself for having attempted
to source the oeuvre
of bob dylan...
                   ****!
****!
                ****!
it should have always been
about frank zappa!
and never about bob dylan!

             oh well... by now
it's simply:
  
      yeah, all that, and... whatever.

— The End —