Frank Matagrano, born 28 December 1971, has had his poetry accepted in various publications including Exquisite Corpse, Cross Connect and The Melic Review. Pudding House Publications (www.puddinghouse.com) released a chapbook of his poems, "Moving Platform," in April, 2000. Currently, he lives in New York and serves as an Assistant Vice President for a corporation in downtown Manhattan.
Holding on before Letting Go
I pull her hair to share
the anxiety, always this close
to hitting a car,
the last one filled
with nuns, their quick
swerve left,
unwilling to meet
Jesus dressed like this.
Everyone's hand on something:
door handle, head rest, belt
buckle, braced, pure white grip,
my fingers wound
round what resembles.
© Frank Matagrano
Cc'd on the Crucifixion
Never met the one who jumped
off the roof of the Merrill Lynch -
it's called Black Friday
for another reason:
a quote from the Latin
transcribed on ticker,
last floating in shreds
above the world
series parade
recycled
from the 44th floor,
a white body
adrift, a man's
crucifixion via email.
I was cc'd;
his last name, Parent.
© Frank Matagrano
Flagging a Cab to the Airport
If salt doesn't melt the snow,
a tire headlong down 33rd will.
Fifty more cabs
will pass yet - a crack
on the passenger's side;
a breath, white, excess,
leaving, always someone.
I will flag one down
rather than take the train
to Penn Station
this time; a duffle
slung over shoulder
will be enough.
I know the phone numbers
by heart, the names to ask for.
I'll leave my work here:
one fifty token,
metal turnstile,
broken intercom,
muddy sole, gloved palm,
crumpled feather,
crowded platform,
step aside, giddy up.
I will dust ghosts
off my shoulder;
for the last time,
I will tell the driver
where to go.
Frank Matagrano
Laid out on a Mead near the Fox River
I spread myself thin.
The graze has its way
with me without you
here, my water,
my honey,
my drunk fuck.
The breath of the Fox
runs over the fuzzy mead,
pushing origami
sails to the paper edge
of this hair I call you.
© Frank Matagrano
Counting the Number of Angels of Death at the Hospital
In rabbinic writings, there are at least a dozen angels of death...
-- from A Dictionary of Angels, by Gustav Davidson
I counted three last time:
two on smoke break
near the door on York Ave;
name tag affixed
to wing, and upstairs,
the third, room 915 B,
the shadow of a ruffled
feather over grandma's diseased
breast, one long florescent bulb
above the bed, a box of white
tissues from the grocer,
a half-empty glass of juice
on the tray, mom asleep
in one of two visitor chairs,
her sister in the other,
bent over, pulling up the tongue
of an untied shoe.
© Frank Matagrano
(first appeared in Supralurid, Volume 1, Issue 2)
The Spokes of Her Wheelchair
What Anthony did was stick
an eight of clubs between
the spokes of her wheelchair.
Every time she clicked
from the sink to the stove,
her great grand-daughter lost it,
bent over in stitches,
two
black
pony
tails
hanging for dear life to a scalp.
© Frank Matagrano
Telling Rita the Truth
You crave
other words
in exchange
for "place,"
I offer three
on this couch,
112th, a third
floor space
across from St. John
the Divine pipe
organs bombard,
swell, disintegrate.
© Frank Matagrano
Clearing the Table with Angel Feathers
The bus boy cleared the table
with angel feathers.
A minimum of fifteen pins
on her suspenders,
the waitress served slabs
of pork drenched
in "our famous Jack Daniels
glaze," a stitched grin,
upselling margaritas
to the "ultimate" size,
eighteen ounces of goodness.
© Frank Matagrano
Peeling Potatoes
She removed the eyes,
every one of them
that looked up her skirt
from the sack.
Mashed with the same milk
used to keep the cat quiet
© Frank Matagrano
Miss Julie Watched from the Porch
The pug dragged baby Jesus
by the ankle across the lawn;
its owner chased the dog
with a broom, all six footprints
blurring circles in the snow.
Miss Julie wore an extra large sweater
over a sleeveless sun
dress, pulled up
enough by the draft
to show a piece
of something.
© Frank Matagrano
Three Photographs of the Same Girl
1
She stood beside the bride in front
of a church whose name didn't matter.
2
Half her body reflected in the aluminum side
of a subway car, a teardrop
on the cleanest surface inside that train,
a hole in the middle of a plastic seat
to her right, white gauze stuffed in
the crack, forced in place by a thick clear coat.
3
Atop a staircase that creaked,
black dress strapped to a thin
waist, my arm wrapped around it twice,
her teeth pulling, pulling the tongue
from my mouth, resting it in her own.
© Frank Matagrano
Setting the Liz Christy Memorial Garden on Fire
Someone left the cake out in the rain.
from "MacArthur's Park"
The long spine will feel what
the cigarette flicked a few steps
behind me has done,
nerve rubbed two ways:
one toward 59th and Lexington,
the other going back down Route 4
to the River Road exit -
an office on one side,
small church to the right,
a mile past the A&P to Baldwin,
the Japanese maple gone,
hole scabbed with lawn,
combing the block for an hour
before recognizing which car
my father drove, which bent
tulips were planted by my mother,
the painted part of curb
that served as third base,
letting the smell of cut grass
and gasoline have its way
one more time, long gone
before the first siren begins
its doppler from 8th Avenue
to the Liz Christy garden,
the burning there, the burying:
fruit sold, lottery ticket,
stroller carried down stairs
and hoisted over turnstile, boom
box propped on boy's shoulder,
a diva wailing for that recipe again.
© Frank Matagrano
