Five Poems

by Mather Schneider

THE CHILDREN INSIDE US  

Natalia and I are watching Snow White on tv

this autumn afternoon.

Snow White of the pure life

who heals with a smile.

Commercials every 12 minutes

for cleaning products

and shiny new cars

and medicine like poisoned apples.

The snow in the fairytale is not cold, not real,

unlike the lesions

on Natalia’s tongue

or the puss that comes like beer foam

or the pills

or the butterless popcorn

or the bleached underwear

on the clothesline.

She falls asleep. I wonder what

she’s dreaming and if

she’ll open her eyes again.

I wish I could kiss her to lift the curse

but it goes against

the doctor’s wishes,

he who is now

her only prince.

She wakes up five minutes later

and asks me if it’s over yet.

Not yet, my sweet, but soon.

As the evil sorceress cackles

at the foolish fresh-cheeked lovers

and the swords of the fearless

horsemen flash

on the mountain.

THE MIRROR

I’m painting a black room white.

My nose bleeds

and drips into the can of white—one drop

taints the whole thing.

I leave to buy more paint

and find myself in a jungle

carrying the pieces of a stranger

in a bag like Santa Claus.

I come to a wall and throw the bag over,

climb up and enter a low-roofed house

where a woman is angry

I’m not who I’m supposed to be.

I see myself in her full-length mirror

like I’m a bird

looking down at the purple canyons

under my eyes.

Out the back door a man is talking on a stage

before a black curtain.

The curtain rises to reveal the same

mirror from the woman’s room

and I’m still in it, the ball of bees

of my head trembling.

The man on the stage lights himself on fire

and whispers, The cure must begin

lower down.

I lay on the ground

and time grows

over me like grass.

SICK 

I am talking to a man on the phone

in thrall of his melodic voice.

I ask him where I can find a pharmacy.

He gives me cross streets.

It’s my dead uncle’s old pharmacy.

I stand outside the entrance

which my memory says should be bigger.

The man from the phone shows up.

He shakes a spray-paint can and the pebble inside

rattles like an addict’s last pill

then he kneels as if to pray

and spray-paints a yellow handicap sign on the pavement

freehand.

He says,

Good dreams are no better than good thoughts

unless they find a footing in the world.

He doesn’t look like his voice

and points to my abdomen.

I look down and see a hole in me.

I dig things out of it:

scarves, wires, books, noodles, playing cards

Venus fly traps, slime, bugs.

In a panic I go into the pharmacy

and start opening bottles at random

but each one contains nothing but a single, tiny human soul

that cowers from the light.

BROKEN EGGS

I am a hired hand on a small farm.

The owner is a blind man with a big beard

who calls himself Noah.

He runs a tight ship.

My first duty is to gather eggs from the chicken coop

which looks like an antique wardrobe.

I open the top drawer where two chickens are making love.

I am embarrassed and tell them

Sorry, just doing my job.

I dig my hand under them and pull out two eggs,

both broken.

I open the next drawer

and there’s a Chihuahua in there

barking its head off.

I open another drawer and see a little town

with tiny people walking around.

The people look up at me as if squinting into the sun.

The fourth drawer is full of water

in which nothing reflects.

I dip my hands in and wash my face.

I walk away to look for a towel to dry myself

and see a pregnant woman and Noah sitting on the porch

in a couple of gopherwood rockers.

I ask Noah if he’s the father

but he only smiles and touches my wet face

and asks me if it’s raining.

THE GUILT-SOAKED BOY

The love of my life lives on the other side of the highway.

We can’t cross it.

The only way we can communicate is by waves

and by kicking a soccer ball

back and forth across the highway.

When she kicks it to me I pick it up and smell it

(it smells like her feet which I love)

and read the little notes she’s attached

in which she’s written tender innocent poems

with little hearts and x’s and o’s.

One day I am angry at this fate which keeps us apart

and I kick the ball too hastily

in front of a truck which swerves and turns over

causing more cars to crash behind it.

People scream and fall out of their vehicles

as they burst into flames.

Blood flows and mixes with the oil and gasoline.

It blocks my view and I can’t see her anymore.

The cars pile up for thousands of miles

into the cities in a chain reaction

that spreads across the land all the way to the shores

spilling toxins into the seas and killing the fish

that far-away islanders rely on to feed their children.

The smoke billows up and blackens the sky and the birds

choke and fall to the ground like pumice.

I am frightened at what I have done and run and hide.

I hope the love of my life runs too.

I stay cooped up in a forgotten lighthouse

reading her notes and breathing their fragrance

that fades each minute in the foul air.

The authorities pass by below 

hunting for the guilt-soaked boy 

who has caused so much pain and suffering,

who has brought the world to a screeching halt.

BIO: Mather Schneider's poetry and prose have appeared in many places since 1995. He lives in Tucson and works as an exterminator.