Jean-Mark Sens
A-C Bird Jazz
“Naked with Summer in my mouth.”
–Al Purdy
Strangled whirling of a whistle
bird of metal
electric, vent trapped
Freon controlled
it twirls a cool whiff
in my barren office
summer in my mouth
reprieve against the heat
my hair, wet
capping my skull
To breathe here
in tinglings
to the very end of my skin
tremolo shrills in the unit
feel me naked
against the cold sung air
throated out
in stuttering chirps
the thermostat cuts off
standing up in front of the A-C
my body
one block
over 70% humidity
isotope sweat/water
archeologists will date us
with carbon 14
by a trace of breathed freon
death ferments
laced with ammonium and lead.
Garlic
It ripples, sputters and yellows,
laughter in the sizzling oil
seasoning food and pan
deep in the cast iron
as the fragrance opens its pores
throughout the house.
The garlic squats on the shelf,
closed fist of a tight bulb
wrapped in silk paper.
You hold it by the head
and tear off a first clove
that flakes silver petals.
You pull each rib off this plenteous madame.
Uncorsetted, she leaves you with nothing
but a dry stem from an unassuming shoot.
You lay some sixteen teeth on the cutting board
ready to bite a dead kiss.
Jean-Mark Sens was born in France and educated in Paris. He taught English at the University of Mississippi and holds degrees in English from the University of Southern Mississippi, and Paris VII university, and an Associate in Science in Culinary Arts from Johnson & Wales. He has published poems in various magazines in the U.S. and Canada, including International Poetry Review, Xavier Review, Painted Bride, Whiskey Island, Ariel, Descant, CV2, Queen’s Quarterly, Zygote, Mississippi Review, and Weber Studies.