Four Poems by Gerald Yelle

Lens Cap

I put the magic glasses on and they made
food taste like sweet stewed
tomatoes and music more layered than
rain. They made acne disappear
along with
toenail fungus and muscle strain.
Other than that nothing happened.
It was perfect. It was like the time in
France when wolves
nipped at my fingers and thighs.
I drew a line in the sand
and dared myself to step across
and then I did.
I thought about the Alps and how to
get where maybe there’d be
flocks of sheep and fast dirt roads
and later Himalayas
where friends roll tax cuts into IRAs
and play upon the world’s
sodden stage.
Other friends want to level the field
but I don’t take the glasses off.
I’d rather stare through empty frames.

Another One Rides the Bus

And when he gets off nobody’s there.
And when he goes around
the back of the depot no one’s there
either. He does his business
in the men’s room
and jiggles the handle. Out of habit.
He doesn’t look back.
A phone rings. He knows who it is
before they answer.
He hangs up and goes out and it’s
crowded. Everyone’s standing
in line. He wants to know if the bus
is going to Baltimore.
Why? one says, you want to be
a witness? He stumbles
while standing still. When the bus
comes they board. One
by one they board and they’re gone.

The Visit

We’re in the living room when the bell rings.
I get a spare chair and a beach chair and go
see who it is: Roy and Em. I say come in
and go fix myself a drink. I take a paper cup
and a plastic cup. I pour one into the other.
I can’t decide which to use. I go to the porch
to see why Roy and Em haven’t come in
and hear Roy say his mother’s missing. I say
we have to find her. He says let me finish.
She’s missing the keys to her car. She won’t
stop looking for them in her underwear
drawer and every torn and talcumed pocket
of her purse, but they aren’t there: his sister
took them when their mother rearended
the mailman but the car’s still in the driveway
and it’s driving her nuts because she thinks
she can go to the store if she can just find
the keys, and his sister can’t find them either.
They have to get the damned thing towed.

Lee’s House

I went to take Ellen out for breakfast
and the street that was dry last
night had a foot of water in it. Cats
were sniffing around for a way across.
There was a current, not strong
unless you helped it along by going
with the flow. It was the only thing
I could do. It went around and around
like the whirlpools we used to make
in our friends’ pool. I got out in
the alley behind Lee’s. Ellen was
sitting on the porch. I said it’s a good
idea to keep an eye on the place
while Lee’s away. I assumed Lee
was away. I looked in the window
and didn’t see anyone. Ellen had a bag
on her lap and kept touching her
leg. I said are you alright. She said
she had a headache. Dogs were
barking, kids yelling, cars sloshing
in the shallows. I went and sat by her.
She laid her head in my lap and
I rubbed it till she said I could stop.



Gerald Yelle’s books include “Love Bomb,” “Evolution for the Hell of It,” “the bored” and “The Holyoke Diaries.” His chapbooks include “No Place I Would Rather Be” and “A Box of Rooms.” He lives in Amherst, Massachusetts and is active on Facebook.