POPPIES

On the third Wednesday, she’ll appear.  The street’ll be covered in poppies.  We’ll make sure of that.  It’ll be a sunny day – hot – but it’ll be snowing.  This is June we’re talking about.  All the lampposts’ll be draped in black silk.  All but one.  It’ll give off a green light.  Another thing we’ll take care of.  Thirty-five Pomeranians’ll be scattered throughout the yards – headless.  We’ll make sure that a high-pitched siren’ll be going off in the distance.  It’ll be blaring that Queazy Yakuza song.  The 42 minute one.  Nothing but wailing guitar feedback and howls.  And there she’ll be, center of the street, dressed in a blue checkerboard dress, carrying a basket full of straw.  She’ll be blind-folded with a red scarf.  The scarf’ll be a loose-toothed corduroy.  She’ll be singing an old Negro spiritual, though we haven’t figured out which one yet.  She should answer to the name of Glenda, but that won’t be her real name.  You’ll have a conversation about baseball.  Whatever you do, don’t talk about balks.  She’ll give you a red, metal heart.  You’ll walk away.  In thirty-eight years, we’ll do this all over again.  We hope we’ve made it all clear enough.




-SLL