Rose & Thorn Journal - Winter 2012
James Valvis is the author of How To Say Goodbye (Aortic Books, 2011). He has published hundreds of poems in places like Anderbo, Arts & Letters, New York Quarterly, Poetry East, Rattle, River Styx and Verse Daily. His fiction is also widely published in places like Los Angeles Review, Potomac Review, StorySouth and Washington Pastime. He lives in Issaquah, Washington.
James Valvis
The Nazis at the Pool
Call me a crank or a conservative, Goering or Goebbels,
but when I see how these young girls dress at the pool
all I want is to throw a towel around them and send them home.
Sometimes I wish we could return to the days when men in ties
walked the beaches with rulers to assure a woman’s bathing suit
didn’t rise six inches above the top of the knee. Go ahead
and laugh if you want. Or bring up Hitler, Himmler, or Hess.
That’s fine with me. My daughter asks, why is that girl’s bikini
going up her backside, Daddy? And I tell my baby it’s because
she thinks that’s pretty, that’s sexy, that’s the way to get a boy
to pay attention, this garment charging up the crack of her ass
is the end result of a thousand marches and protests and such,
so keep your voice down, we wouldn’t want to offend anyone
with our atavistic thinking, my darling daughter, my fellow Nazi.
Who the Hell Is Ernest Borgnine?
Short, bug-eyed, with a pompadour, John looked like James Dean playing
a psychotic elf, and he arrived at my night job and demanded I take a break,
though I’d just gotten there, because he wanted to show me his new girlfriend
and her car, which he said was tarred by her ex-boyfriend, and so we went
outside and sure enough half the car was coated in black goo, and he stood
next to his girlfriend, who looked exactly like Ernest Borgnine, his arm thrown
over her shoulder like some swordfish he’d hooked, and he told me revenge
was necessary and tonight we would find the ex-boyfriend and let him know
this kind of shit wasn’t acceptable, and I said, Sure, I’ll come along, because
friends is friends, but let me finish my shift.
Later, after I’d made my last
batch of fried chicken and honey biscuits, John met me outside the restaurant
away from the girl who sat in the car and he told me the truth: the ex-boyfriend
hadn’t tarred the car, he had done it himself after Borgnine wouldn’t put out,
and that we weren’t really going to kick any ass, just scare the guy a bit, play
like heroes, and afterwards me, John, and the girlfriend could have ourselves
a monnot oh three, or whatever they call it, and alone behind the tarred window
I could see Ernest Borgnine was starting to catch on and scared, and though
I knew sooner or later, maybe tonight, John and I were going to be in prison
or dead or something along those lines, I said, Sure, because friends is friends,
and screw Roy and his fried chicken, it’s just me, you, and Ernest Borgnine,
and John said, That’s it, friends is friends, buddies is buddies, but use the other
door, that side’s been tarred shut, and who the hell is Ernest Borgnine anyway?
The Nazis at the Pool
Call me a crank or a conservative, Goering or Goebbels,
but when I see how these young girls dress at the pool
all I want is to throw a towel around them and send them home.
Sometimes I wish we could return to the days when men in ties
walked the beaches with rulers to assure a woman’s bathing suit
didn’t rise six inches above the top of the knee. Go ahead
and laugh if you want. Or bring up Hitler, Himmler, or Hess.
That’s fine with me. My daughter asks, why is that girl’s bikini
going up her backside, Daddy? And I tell my baby it’s because
she thinks that’s pretty, that’s sexy, that’s the way to get a boy
to pay attention, this garment charging up the crack of her ass
is the end result of a thousand marches and protests and such,
so keep your voice down, we wouldn’t want to offend anyone
with our atavistic thinking, my darling daughter, my fellow Nazi.
Who the Hell Is Ernest Borgnine?
Short, bug-eyed, with a pompadour, John looked like James Dean playing
a psychotic elf, and he arrived at my night job and demanded I take a break,
though I’d just gotten there, because he wanted to show me his new girlfriend
and her car, which he said was tarred by her ex-boyfriend, and so we went
outside and sure enough half the car was coated in black goo, and he stood
next to his girlfriend, who looked exactly like Ernest Borgnine, his arm thrown
over her shoulder like some swordfish he’d hooked, and he told me revenge
was necessary and tonight we would find the ex-boyfriend and let him know
this kind of shit wasn’t acceptable, and I said, Sure, I’ll come along, because
friends is friends, but let me finish my shift.
Later, after I’d made my last
batch of fried chicken and honey biscuits, John met me outside the restaurant
away from the girl who sat in the car and he told me the truth: the ex-boyfriend
hadn’t tarred the car, he had done it himself after Borgnine wouldn’t put out,
and that we weren’t really going to kick any ass, just scare the guy a bit, play
like heroes, and afterwards me, John, and the girlfriend could have ourselves
a monnot oh three, or whatever they call it, and alone behind the tarred window
I could see Ernest Borgnine was starting to catch on and scared, and though
I knew sooner or later, maybe tonight, John and I were going to be in prison
or dead or something along those lines, I said, Sure, because friends is friends,
and screw Roy and his fried chicken, it’s just me, you, and Ernest Borgnine,
and John said, That’s it, friends is friends, buddies is buddies, but use the other
door, that side’s been tarred shut, and who the hell is Ernest Borgnine anyway?
