BARENAKED Your barenaked body In the memories of my mind Is more happy to see Than these keys Upon which I type As quick as light As slower than molasses Sliding uphill And how excellent our bodies together Were I remember also now And think about With my toes numb from the beer And Dylan playing As I think About Your barenaked body Warm and soft Up against My last good rememberings In this The second half of life My barenaked body cold now And in need of clothes And closure Getting dressed in the dark But still hoping DRAGONFLY There was a moment – We heard a noise and saw the Dragongfly Bumping up against the fluorescent ceiling light Higher than we could reach He or she Was the size of my index finger And he or she kept bumping his or her prehistoric body Up against the harmless light We looked up and Anita, Who admits an aversion to insects Admitted this dragonfly Was indeed beautiful And I agreed I told her something about prehistoric dragonflies, Their oxygenated inflated size And that sea scorpions were as big as we are today And were among the first sea-dwellers to take to land And then we moved on To something work related I guess I don’t even remember the conversation drifting As for what the dragonfly then did…. I don’t really know
John Tustin’s poetry has appeared in many disparate literary journals since 2009. fritzware.com/johntustinpoetry contains links to his published poetry online.
Flight of the dragonfly 