Islands

A pile of mannequins discarded
on a downtown street;
torsos, legs and faces
protruding
from a shallow cardboard box..

and a strange thing happened
while I stood there like an island
in the headlong current of a crowd:
the complex faces of pedestrians
faded out
and sunlight crowned
the simple wooden heads.

And from this sea of anonymity
a beat old man arose
to claim for all of us–
a face.

From that pile of dismembered mannequins
he gracefully selected a bust
and set off down the sidewalk,
drawing flies and stares.

A pair of breasts
stuck out like a heavy board
from underneath his coat;

and thus returned us to our faces,
lying north and a little west
to islands of the heart.

Poem taken from the chap book Strange Attractors. First edition July 1993. 200 issues. Co-producer: Mark Stueve of Old Erie Street Bookstore Cleveland, Ohio. Front cover art by Harland Ristau. Lettering by Big Web. Back cover art by Dan Nielsen. Text artwork by t.l. & Carolyn Kryss & Hilary Krzywkowsk. Co-edited by Mark Weber & Mark Stueve. Photo of t.l.kryss by mark weber 18may89. (c)1993 by Zerx Press & t.l. kryss, 5016 Inspiration Dr, SE, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87108