Antipoem 4 Santo and Johnny

AntiPoem 4 “Santo and Johnny” (Poet’s instruction- Play “Sleepwalk” twice by Santo and Johnny while reading) Santo and Johnny play Sleepwalk on Fender steel and bass Just oozing out their mellow electric dream sound as the Santa Monica Pier exudes under a blue napkin of sky voices Lifting tanned bodies aloft into the maelstrom of sun and stars The world sneezes and belches out high octane cries of desire Armed with young ideas and brittle baskets of sunset lovemaking Democrats and Republicans engorge the sun with rum and cigars As Johnny and Lana drink lizard-shoe cocktails at the Formosa The Platters glide across the cathode sky singing Smoke Gets In Your Eyes The ’58 impala cruises at 75 miles per hour with Bobby Rydell driving Jackie Robinson hits a liner against the Tydol sign at Ebbets He rounds second base with cleats digging into the hard ground Driving home Pee Wee Reese in the roaring Flatbush shadows Democrats and Republicans devour frankfurters and drink tequila al fresco As Joe and his wife meet Bogie for beers and cigarettes behind third There Jackie Robinson stands in an indomitable black sheen of sweat Muscular as a lion bent on the kill by a river he dances the line fantastic This magnificent eagle taloned for the high ascendances without wings Santo and Johnny sit in the bleachers searching for beauty and truth as Preacher Roe walks in from the bullpen with his lanky spitter spinning Abraham Zapruder climbs a white abutment in Dealey Plaza wearing black The Midnight Blue is turning on Elm and now it is showtime in 1963 Twenty-six seconds of a national nightmare a Bell & Howell blood orgy as Miss Sitzman throttles his business attire from behind steadying his hand Democrats and Republicans wave to a legend and take screaming Polaroids Santo and Johnny play Sleepwalk to the gasping pigeons who scatter like flies The Babushka Lady insists on playing The Singing Nun as morticians gather Brain matter and roses spray the Dallas denizens as they flee to the bullets Jackie decides on second thought to retrieve the husband’s brain in the roar Miss America stops waving and Bert Parks stops singing the deed is done Santo and Johnny have tamed the Cooper Hawks they have bowed their heads As Santo glides his steel fingers across the American landscape of gun violence Father Flanagan herds his boys for the big cakewalk in a drawn circle of death Democrats and Republicans will dutifully carry their Captain to his deep grave They are the broken-hearted fathers and brothers seeking another close dance Another flirtation with new nights dallying with pillbox ladies wearing pink roses The sun is forever setting in Dealey Plaza as the black phantom hearse drives by Again and again for an eternity of unending gaspings by the stunned witnesses Sleepwalk is playing through the pergola loudspeakers now in the autumn dusk As undead ghosts cry alone again astride the green expanse of lawn and life