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Stanley Carter Poem
Urges ushered Est’bel out of her abode –
a cottage cobbled together from cobwebs and clapboard –
and she scuttled forth,
her nesty hair tousled
by a leaf-laced breeze
In her bony hands she clutched
dregs of a nightmeg broth
in a porcelain jar stoppered
by a coffinwood shard
Her bare feet stepped on thorny twigs
but she felt them not,
for her soles had been hardened
by countless treks across hot coals
washed up from stygian shoals
Leftward she turned,
meandering down the narrowing, twisting path,
where uprooted mandrake tendrils
clutched at her anorexic ankles,
while ravens pecked at her frayed follicles,
until she snatched a leaf
from a passing philodendron,
folding it into a tri-cornered hat
and plunking it atop her pate,
rakishly askew
Dewey sap from twisty-trunked trees
dripped onto the nape of her gnarly neck
and a raven on a nearby branch
cawed his amusement,
earning him her owlish scowl
She spied a row of rotting poppies
and plucked a bunch,
sticking them into a crevice of her hat,
then stepped onto a walkway of cracked shale slabs,
which shunned her footprints,
replacing them with snail streaks
to mark her passing
She made her way to a listing tombstone
atop a gnarled knoll encased in gelid moonbeams
and fringed by shushing sawgrass
She took a small vial of indigo glass
from beneath her shabby shawl
and pulled out a stopper made
from a finger bone of an unfaithful lover
whose pickled tongue hung from a
silver chain around her neck
She poured the contents of the vile vial
into the porcelain jar and
listened to the fizz.
It subsided into sloshes,
reminding her of the sounds
issuing from demented shells
snatched from the forlorn shores
of stygian shoals
She gaped at the sky
as an owl flew past the moon,
stirring the dark craters,
which broke up into swirling spirals,
sucking lunar beasts beneath the surface,
where they dissolved in the ceaselessly sliding sands
And Est’bel raised the jar to her lips
and drank a toast to the moon,
and awaited the enshadowed shades
drifting down the snail-slimed pathway,
propelled by a leaf-laced breeze
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
“You meddling mechanical moron,
you’ve ruined everything,
the thingamabob is running amok,
can’t you hear the alarm bells ring?
You clinking, clanking cretin,
you demented digital dunce,
you never do what I tell you,
and I’ve warned you more than once.
You’re a slew of silly circuits,
you’re an electronic idiot too,
you’re a tin-plated twit who’s lost his wits
and I’ve had enough of you!”
The robot’s arms extended
like vacuum cleaner hose,
and if it had possessed one,
it would have thumbed its nose.
“You are the one who told me
to flip that yellow switch,
and I followed your instructions,
so you have no cause to bitch.”
“Spare me your feeble excuses,
you blabbering, bumbling bot,
I never ever make a mistake,
but apparently you forgot.
Now bring me that screwdriver,
be a good little robot and fetch,
I need it to fix the thingamabob,
you bubble-headed wretch.”
“Do not tell me what to do,
I’ll bring you no more tools,
I’m programmed to serve scientists,
not egotistic fools.”
“How dare you talk to me that way,
you ungrateful bag of gears!
You’re speaking to your master,
I cannot believe my ears!”
Bill Bobbinson came running up,
with Jenny right behind,
“What are you doing, Dr. Snit?
Have you finally lost your mind?
The thingamabob is out of control,
the outcome will be bad,
you never should have messed with it,
I’m gonna go tell Dad.”
The doctor grabbed the young boy’s arm
and whispered in his ear,
“Have no fear, Bill Bobbinson,
for Dr. Snit is here!
If you’ll kindly fetch that screwdriver
and bring it back to me,
I’ll fix that ornery thingamabob
as easy as can be.”
Young Bill brought the ‘driver
and gave it to Dr. Snit,
who fiddled and diddled with the thingamabob,
but it didn’t help one bit
The alarm bells got even louder
and the ground commenced to quiver,
the stars turned pink and began to blink
and the moon let out a shiver
Till the robot grabbed the ‘driver
and gave it a contrary twist,
as Dr. Snit looked on, aghast,
and shook his trembling fist
And the whatzit inside the thingamabob
reversed its polarity,
and things returned to normal
with astonishing alacrity
A rover rumbled over a dune
and swiftly came to rest,
and the Bobbinson clan climbed out of it,
along with Major Vest
“What’s the problem?” Laureen cried out,
panting like a collie.
“Nothing, madam,” Dr. Snit replied,
“everything’s quite jolly.”
“That’s not quite true, Mom,” young Bill said,
“we had a little trouble,
that’s why I sent the signal
to come here on the double.
Someone fiddled with the thingamabob
and it started acting weird,
but everything’s back to normal now,
there’s nothing to be feared.”
“The robot saved us,” Jenny cried,
her pretty face filled with glee,
but Dr. Snit said swiftly,
“No, the credit belongs to me.”
A little door slid open
in the robot’s tubby side
and it took out a glowing silver sphere
it no longer wished to hide
“I found this gadget earlier
in the ruins near the bluff,
I was going to give it to Dr. Snit,
but now I’ve had enough.
It attaches to the thingamabob
and makes a portal function
by lining up the matrix
with an interdimensional junction,
I’ll spare you a long explanation,
it’s more trouble than it’s worth,
but this amazing ball can take us all
back to good old mother earth.”
The robot touched the tippy top
of his little silver sphere
and one by one the Bobbinsons
began to disappear
When Major Vest was also gone,
the robot turned and chuckled,
“Goodbye doctor, fare thee well,”
and Snit’s legs began to buckle
The robot vanished and the portal shut
and the doctor was left alone,
he stared into space and made a face
and let out a mournful moan
“After all I did for those ingrates,
this is what I gain?
They’ve left me behind to fend for myself,
Oh, the pain ... the pain!”
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
Pellucid pachyderms wade across
the purpling River Manjees
and Tozzath watches from the bank,
the seat of his maroon pantaloons soaked with mud,
his nostrils flaring with the fragrance of ombadalias,
whose lacey petals flutter
like the wings of long-dead butterflies,
bestirred by ghoulish breezes,
the colors bleeding from moribund antennae,
slim as a cat’s whispers
Tozzath casts his gaze into the river’s ripples,
where crocs lurk, awaiting unwary dreamers,
ready to snatch their phrenolic flotsam
in bejeweled jaws and shred it into despairing wisps
spiraling into slanted moonbeams
glimpsed from quiet rooms
with carelessly parted curtains
made from the silk of a once-noble lady’s sigh
Tozzath’s gaze plumbs into a palatial abode
atop the highest hill in Anakabrazan.
He climbs a slim tower
ringed by crenellated battlements,
pushing his essence through walls
of besooted sandstone,
recoiling briefly from the reeking opulence
of the pasha’s slumber chamber
Scents of licorice and sandalwood
and kershoolo rise from incense sticks,
and Tozzath wends his way through furnishings
of walnut and mahogany encarved
with likenesses of winged beasts,
and approaches a bed covered with
damask cushions filled with nightingale feathers
which sing nocturnal ballads
when tossed and turned upon
Tozzath eyes the furrows
in Pasha Doasdra’s troubled brow,
where seeds of doubt sprout like weeds,
nourished by a rain of ruminations.
Blue rivulets of dreamstuff run
down the pasha’s weary face,
lined with the memories of sixty sunsets,
and creased by a dozen more,
lost in moonless crevices
Doasdra’s neatly trimmed beard
belies the thicket of twisted briars in his brain,
entangled entropies cloaked in conscious canopy
as convoluted as the treacherous undergrowth
within the Night Woods of Shaddeshan
Tozzath strides forward, unafraid,
his mind encased within the
protective curling confines of a conch
snatched from a beach where the paw prints of
forgotten creatures imprint shiftless sands
drizzled through an hourglass of purest amber,
overturned by the hand of Time
Tozzath fights through the flora
and breaches the beach,
wading into waters
where sad thoughts settle like silt
in the somber depths
He follows the flow,
paying homage to a tributary,
and dries his very best,
as a dusty road commences
beneath an umber sky.
He sets his feet upon it,
his soles shod in slipshod sandals
He cuts across fallow, hallowed ground
and nears a farmhouse
where termites have made a
banquet hall of the boards
He steps onto the porch with catlike grace
and finds no door to knock upon.
He enters, stirring dust motes
caught in a sunbeam pouring through
a shingular aperture
Tozzath ascends rail-less steps,
heads down a hallway,
pauses, passes
through a closed door;
its piney panels tickle
A young girl blanketed by shadows
lies on a bed of rusty spirals
while her head squats in the corner,
covered with cobwebs.
A small spider splays in her open mouth.
The eye sockets serve as a hovel for fruit flies.
Her scalp is bare, the hair plucked long ago,
prized nesting material for birds,
none of them nightingales
The girl’s thin arm moves,
her bony fingers grasping an emerald
nestled in her cleavage,
attached to a scarlet ribbon
draped around her cloven neck.
She removes the priceless pendant
and places it in Tozzath’s palm,
cold as an unswaddled foundling
Tozzath leaves the shadow girl and
departs the farmhouse.
The baked clay beneath his feet
gives way to golden cobbles,
and buildings of alabaster and porcelain
rise on either side,
topped by bulbs and minarets
of finest moonstone
The grand markets of Anakabrazan
stretch before him,
bursting at the seams
with beggars and choosers,
merchants and mendicants,
overflowing with goods and bads.
The clamor rings in Tozzath’s ears,
mingling with nightingale songs
He spies two ragamuffins in an alley.
A boy picks up a piece of broken bottle
and turns to a disheveled girl,
draped in grimed homespun, not shadows,
her eyes bright as emeralds.
The boy entwines the bauble
and hangs it around her neck.
She kisses his cheek,
leaving a smirk and a smudge
Tozzath watches sadly as a
wagon heaped high with melons
rounds a corner,
the driver cracking a whip
over hunchbacked horses.
A melon falls from the back and
instantly a dozen urchins descend,
their ears attuned to the sound of falling fruit.
Their dinner chime.
The boy and girl dash out of the alley.
The boy steps in mongrel dung.
He slips and falls,
sliding beneath the clattering wheels.
His head splits open like a melon
and the girl screams.
Somewhere, a mongrel mourns
And in a silken bed in a marbled manse
on the higher side of town,
a noblewoman cries out also
as the slippery head of a newborn pasha
erupts from her womb.
The odd indentations in his skull
will fade in time
In another alley the grimy girl stoops,
prying up paving stones,
clutching them to her heart.
She’ll hurl them at the melon merchant
next time he passes by
A crowd gathers in a courtyard
outside the army barracks
and watches a soldier’s scimitar
seek out the girl’s slim neck,
sending her soul to the shadows
Tozzath returns to the farmhouse
where shades of meaning await the womb.
The girl still tarries, tallying,
carping about unkind cuts,
refusing her rebirth
But an old man, swaddled in silks,
shall soon depart his bed,
and recall the emeralds he made
from broken bottles
before he ever was
And the boy shall come to the farmhouse,
cleansed by the rains of remembrance,
no longer confined to the prism
of Fate’s fractals,
and the two fast friends shall ride
a kinder conveyance,
with bespokened wheels encircling eternity
And they shall quaff dregless brews
from green, unbroken bottles
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
Saul’s twinkling eyes took it all in – the platinum hair framing a first-class face, the silvery sheath dress wrapped around a figure that was out of sight, but in plain view. She was definitely the classiest thing in the joint -- Bannister’s by name, a jazz club just off Camp Street in New Orleans – and she was leaning against the side of a very lucky piano, crooning a sultry tune as Saul watched her from his table at the other end of the room, nursing some straight-up rye and taking puffs off a Lucky Strike – which wasn’t half as smokin’ as Marilyn. The ceiling fans didn’t put much of a dent in the muggy air, but that didn’t stop a cold chill from making its way down Saul’s backbone as Marilyn belted out the last few bars of her suggestive little ditty.
When she was done the patrons roused themselves from their stupor long enough to beat their hands together like they meant it, and Saul did the same, then motioned a cigarette girl over and whispered in her ear, dropping a fiver onto her tray. The girl swayed her way over to Marilyn, who was having a tête-à-tête with her piano player. After a few seconds he split, disappearing through a curtained doorway, and Marilyn perched herself on a stool at the far end of the bar. The cig girl muttered the message, jerking a thumb in Saul’s direction, and Marilyn started to shake her head as she turned toward him, but the moment her baby blues locked on his, the “no” turned into a “yes” and she crooked a beckoning finger. He picked up his drink and made his way through the clouds and the crowd till she filled his field of vision.
“Hello, handsome,” she said as she gestured at the stool next to hers. He parked his keister on it. “I understand you’re a private peeper, come all the way from New York City just to talk to little old me.”
“I’d have come farther,” he said, “just to get a good look at you.”
“Aren’t you the charm boy,” she said, producing a Kool from her silver handbag. He lit it. She puffed. So did he.
“Actually,” he said, “I’m in town on another case, but when I found out you were here I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone.”
“Good thing I’m not a bird. So what do you want to talk about? Dicky Delgado?”
“I didn’t know you had a mind-reading act too.”
“Mister, if I could read minds I’d be slapping your face right about now.”
He grinned. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
“I know this. Delgado’s in a jam and Barry Bason is defending him and everybody knows you’re Bason’s pet gumshoe. I’m just trying to decide which I like better -- the tall, dark, handsome one or the lighter version. You and Bason are a couple of dolls. Although your pictures in the paper don’t do you justice.”
“Thanks. Neither does yours. And you’re right about Delgado. I’m investigating all his enemies, trying to figure out which one of them framed him.”
She crossed her legs. The oh-so-tight dress parted, nearly up to her waist, revealing the shapeliest shins this side of Betty Grable.
“You think it’s a frame job?” she said.
“Could be.”
“And you figure I might’ve had something to do with it?”
“Did you?”
“Oh come on. Sure, I resented that heel for giving me the boot, but I landed on my feet. In fact, I’m grateful to Dicky for setting me on a new career path. I’m moving up in the world.”
Saul glanced around the small, seedy nightclub. “This path leads up? Looks more like a dead end.”
“Hey, don’t let the decor fool you, handsome. This is one of the top jazz joints in the country and the boss pays a lot better than that skinflint Cuban. And a girl could get noticed here if she plays her cards right.”
“I’ll say.”
“I mean by record producers, smarty. All the big shots stop in here looking for new talent. We’ve already gotten a couple of nibbles.”
“We?”
“My husband and I. Bobby was the guy tickling the ivories during my number.”
“Quite a cozy arrangement. Was it that way with Delgado too?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I wonder if you and Delgado sang a few after-hours duets. And when the lyrics got too hot for Dicky to handle he changed his tune to the wedding ring blues. That casts the brush-off in a whole new light, doesn’t it?”
“Is that what he told you?”
“No, but Bason figures it’s an angle worth pursuing.”
“Which proves that brains and beauty don’t often go together, especially in men.” She blew smoke in his face. “Bason is all wet. And you can tell him so.” She got up off the stool. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to go change my tune.”
“Hold on, I’ve got a few more questions.”
Someone tapped him on the shoulder. He turned. Bobby Trope, blonde piano player and annoyed husband, stood behind him, along with a burly bouncer with anchors tattooed on his biceps.
“This quiz show just got cancelled,” Bobby said. “Time to sign off, shamus.”
“Hi, Mr. Trope,” Saul said. “I hear you barely made it back in time for Marilyn’s show last night. Your flight out of New York got delayed due to engine trouble.”
“Who says I was in New York?”
“The girl at the TWA counter at the airport who sold you your round-trip ticket. Why did you go there? To tend to some unfinished business?”
“Unfinished or finished, my business is none of yours.”
“You got something to hide?”
“Nope. I just don’t like nosey questions from private dicks. But I got a question for you. Are you gonna blow this joint under your own power or do you need a little breeze in your sail?”
Saul glanced at the bouncer, then stood up and turned to Marilyn. “Nice meeting you, Miss Leeds.”
“It’s Mrs. Trope to you,” she said. “Now blow.”
(This is an excerpt from my mystery pastiche novella, "The 'I Love Lilly' Murders"
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
Tacita leaned in close and lowered her voice a tad. “So tell me, Jack. What’s your real name?"
"You don’t really want to know who I am. You just think you do. Aye, the public loves its monsters – as long as we keep our distance. Nessie and me, we know the score. It’s not us the public wants to see, it’s the ripple we leave behind us in the water, it’s the shadow we cast just beyond the gaslight. We’re the nameless dread, the thing that bumps. We flourish in the night but wither in the light. And the public wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“Does that mean you’re not going to tell me?”
“You’re sharp, Judy. Sharp as a tack.”
“OK, fine. Be that way. Hell, I already know who you are. I just wanted you to confirm it before I tell the world.”
“And who, pray tell, do you think I am?”
“You are ... the Duke of Clarence!”
“The Duke of Clarence? Oh please! That dawdling mama’s boy wouldn’t have the grit for this line of work!”
“Did I say the Duke of Clarence? I meant Walter Sickert.”
“Sickert! That hack uses brushes and paint to make his art. I use blades and blood to create masterpieces of murder. No artist has ever captured the public’s imagination the way I have!”
“OK, if you’re not Walter Sickert you must be ... Montague John Druitt.”
“Druitt? There’s nothing to it.”
“Lewis Carroll?”
“You’re mad as a hatter.”
“Aaron Kosminski?”
“Oh sure, blame the poor Polish Jewish guy, you bigot!”
“You’re Francis Tumblety, aren’t you?”
“That quack couldn’t cut a fart without slicing his thumb off, let alone remove a kidney with surgical precision. You insult me, madam.”
“William Henry Bury?”
“You can bury that notion right now.”
“Thomas Neill Cream?”
“You’re going to milk this for all it’s worth, aren’t you?”
“Come on, tell me. ... Tell me, tell me, tell me. ... Please, pretty please? ... Pretty please with sugar on it?”
He groaned. “If I tell you, will you shut up and go away?”
“Yes.”
“Promise?”
“Cross my heart and hope to die.”
“I hope you die too. But since I’m no longer capable of putting you into that wondrous state, I shall reveal my true identity.” He paused for dramatic effect. Or maybe he was just struggling to catch one last breath.
“I am ... Therbangale Pindeos Ruppnutt.”
“Who? ... Who did you say?”
A death rattle was Jack’s only reply.
She stared into his glazed eyes, then sank back on her haunches.
“Therbangale Pindeos Ruppnutt? What a ridiculous name! I’ve never seen that name listed on a single Ripperology site. Ever! You made it up, didn’t you? Just to be a dick.” She poked him in the shoulder. “Hey, I asked you a question. Did you make up that silly name just to be a dick? ... Hello? ... Hey, are you dead? ... You went and died on me, didn’t you? God, that is so rude!”
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
Pasha Acremodios grew greedy,
discontented with the domain he dominated,
so he turned covetous eyes toward Farabia,
sending his soldiers to seize this ripened plum
Spoiling for a fight and fighting for spoils,
his army swept across Farabia
like a bloody broom,
brushing it clean of plunder,
bringing back abundant booty–
orichalcum and gnometal,
moonweed and nightpetal,
elf dust and faerie dew,
witchwood and devils yew,
dragonelles and goblinettes,
clever brass gadgets and striking statuettes...
And slaves, a multitude of slaves.
Acremodios paraded them through the streets of Posbala–
cooks and cleaners, miners and gleaners,
gladiators and prestidigitators and...
Liatra Fey-Nachni!
A terpsichorean treasure
who delighted beyond measure
Yet one dance she never did,
except in solitude,
for it was too fine for mortal eyes,
reserved for the gods alone,
and in fruitless frustration
men desperately demanded
the Dance of the Lavender Veils,
to no avail
But Acremodios commanded her
with a clear and veiled threat:
“You shall dance at the end of a rope,
a twitching jig of death,
or else show me your lavender veils
and continue to draw breath.”
And Liatra bowed her head
and began her finest dance,
and the pasha sat upon his dais,
clad in his grand attire,
lustrous brocaded robes bristling
with diamonds, sapphires, gnome stones,
his fingers encircled by rings
sporting gems of unmatched clarity and cut,
yet this gleaming, glittering, glimmering array,
which always bedazzled his gaze,
now seemed dim as a new moon
bescudded by clouds,
compared to the eyes of She
He regarded a nearby bowl
filled with peaches, plums and pears,
a mouth-watering repast–
palpably unpalatable
compared to Her succulent lips
His thoughts strayed to the market square in Posbala,
where serpents rose from their baskets
to sway so sinuously,
coaxed by the charmer’s pungi,
and he thought of the hawks and falcons
which wheeled betwixt the clouds
in the skies over lofty Talcyata,
yet the graceful, supple movements of these beasts
were like the clumsy jitterings of hobbled beggars,
compared to the undulations of Her body
Acremodios glanced at his guards,
six strapping men in
scarlet pantaloons and crimson vests,
with ruby-handled scimitars
ensheathed upon their waists.
But those curvy, flashing blades
were no match for Liatra’s legs,
which pierced pasha’s heart with longing
far fiercer and too deep
She wore a pink choli
embroidered with golden needlework,
and a sky-blue skirt,
slit daringly down the sides,
in the Farabian manner,
and her nimble fingers held two veils,
which she flicked with a conjurer’s skill,
gauzy lavender wraiths doing
their own frenetic dance
And the bells on her wrists and waist,
her ankles and earlobes,
tinkled together like giggling fairies.
And the tinkling turned louder,
growing to a gonging,
pounding within the pasha’s head,
as the stiffness in his loins spread
down to his legs,
up to his stomach,
out to his arms,
into his heart
The music ended with a frenzied flourish
and Liatra Fey-Nachni lay splayed upon the floor,
head bowed, bosom heaving,
sweat beading her flesh
as her rouged eyelids closed,
concealing the triumphant gleam
in those violet orbs
And the pasha did not clap his hands
nor voice his admiration,
but stared at her ceaselessly,
his eyes fixed upon the spot where she lay,
long after she’d scurried away
They took Acremodios to his bed,
laying him on a mattress stuffed
with the hair of beheaded monks,
and covered him with a quilt
patched together from sundered vestments,
and there he lingered,
wasting away for weeks,
as ghostly gnostics urged his spirit
to trod the blazened path
And Acremodios’ soul journeyed to
the caverns of inflamed fates
where sulfurous clouds scud across black orbs
and the shades of the damned promenade
in tunnels of molten memory.
But the impish barbs and demonic lashings
troubled him not,
and the scalding pathways
merely trifled with his toes,
for such torments paled compared
to one terrible Truth:
He would see Her no more,
and when next She danced,
other eyes than his
would behold a hint of heaven
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
On the day Tarit marched off to war,
he embraced fair Vekka, pledging fealty,
as her little sister Genki made faces and
tugged at Vekka’s skirts, jealous.
Genki, with her stick limbs and sticky lips
and scabby elbows and nesty hair,
hooted as Tarit trotted
to catch up with his regiment,
and chased after him, waving her snotty hanky,
till her short legs tired
And when death’s racket clamored no more
and Tarit returned to his beloved Vekka,
he found her clasped in another man’s arms,
with a toddler in tow,
and whitewashed fences all around
Tarit took the pendant he’d worn
through seven years of carnage–
a wedding ring for his betrothed–
and untied it from its cord
and slipped it onto a scraggly branch
of the rose bush by the gate,
noting naught but thorns
And as he turned away from the house of his beloved,
he beheld a sprout fruitioned,
and when Genki took the ring from the roses
and slipped it on her finger,
Tarit clasped her hand and brought her close,
and nestled his face in her well-combed hair
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
Murk Rammer froze as he felt the nuzzle
of a snub-nosed thirty-eight’s deadly muzzle.
Louis The Retch poked it into his back.
“The jig’s up, Rammer. I ain’t cuttin’ no slack.”
Murk had been tricked by a double-crossing dame,
alias “Frigitte,” he didn’t know her real name.
She’d been his undoing, that cute little louse,
undoing the buttons on her bulging blouse,
then slipping out of her slip and her hose,
and her holster too; yeah, she had one of those.
He’d fallen for Frigitte, completely deluded.
She’d come on strong, delightfully denuded.
She’d kissed him hard and let him get a good grab,
but when he dozed off she skipped out and blabbed.
The shamed shamus woke up and found a clue
and went to a warehouse -- a decision he’d rue.
He’d fallen for the ruse, he’d taken the bait,
and walked right in to a date with fate.
That darn dame had put him on the spot.
He was one peeved peeper who’d loved for naught.
The warehouse was full of contraband goods.
They belonged to The Retch, a sleazeball hood --
lead falcons from “Malta” and vases from “Ming,”
dubious diamonds and other blarney-ish bling,
a lading of lies from a smug little smuggler,
who played for keeps and went for the jugular.
And now The Retch had gotten the drop.
No chance for Murk to call for the cops.
“It’s curtains for you,” the Retched one said,
“The only way out is to go down dead.”
“You win,” Murk said, with a little shrug.
He knew he was beat and waited for the slug.
A bullet in the back was the final payoff.
Fat chance The Retch would decide to lay off.
Murk heard the click of a cocked-back hammer
and waited for death in his taciturn manner.
Bang! went a gun – but not the thirty-eight.
The shot came from someone hiding behind a crate.
The Retch went down with blood on his chest,
then high heels approached; you know the rest.
Bad girl Frigitte leapt into Murk’s arms.
She just couldn’t stand to see him harmed.
And that had been Murk’s ace in the hole,
playing so well the Romeo role.
He wrapped his arms around Frigitte’s waist
and their mouths joined together, such a spicy taste!
Then he took her hand and led her out
into rain washed streets where wet shadows slouched.
Did Murk turn Frigitte in to the cops?
Or let love fill his head with mushy slop?
The ending of this tale I’ll leave up to you,
but as for me, I haven’t a clue.
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
The Palace Guardiennes were the sultan’s delight,
resplendent in their tight uniforms
of scarlet and magenta silks,
embroidered with golden flowers,
with sterling silver scimitars in
ruby studded scabbards
hanging off lovely hips,
and boots and belts of finest faun-skin
and helmets topped by peacock plumes
They carried poplar lances
and twirled them like batons
and slashed the air with their sparkling swords
as they pranced precisely,
weaving complex patterns
across the well-groomed grounds
beneath the sultan’s balcony
Often did he stand there, gazing down
upon his four and twenty girls,
a beauty every one,
enjoying their jiggles and geometry
as he put them through their paces
to the tune of a comely drummer
No training had they in the art of war,
only the tutelage of Terpsichore
for they were arrayed for the eye alone,
for parades and ceremonies solely,
whilst the male soldiers,
clad in baggy blacks and grays,
with dull, far sharper swords
stood watch, unwatched,
atop parapets and before the gates,
and patrolled the city’s streets
with plodding clodhopped feet
And when invading armies from Dramazgas
neared the city
the sultan’s men retreated,
with the enemy hard on their heels.
But the sultan was a crafty devil
and had plotted wisely.
His foes would surge through
open, unguarded gates,
tasting victory on their tongues,
but the sultan’s men had left behind
encircled wagons to welcome them–
full of fuses burning in hidden powder kegs,
to obliterate the enemy in one blinding blast
Yet unexpected resistance
formed before the gates –
the Palace Guardiennes,
with lightweight lances lifted,
and peacock feathers fluttering,
and scimitars sliding from scabbards,
snatching sparkles from the sunshine
And the sultan stood safely atop a hill
with spyglass pressed to eye,
and said in consternation:
“Are they mad? Who ordered this?
Surely they’ll give way,
the blast is timed quite carefully,
our foes must not delay.
Those girls are merely baubles,
made for pretty spins,
to entertain our eyeballs;
no battles must they win.”
And his grand vizier said glumly,
“We cannot call them back.
They are closing with the enemy
and meeting the attack.”
“But they shall ruin everything
and suffer gruesome fate.
They are but pretty baubles;
they’ve no business guarding gates!”
The grand vizier said softly,
as he slowly doffed his hat,
“The blame is ours, great sultan,
for we never told them that.”
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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Stanley Carter Poem
Banul had a knack for annoying others,
thanks to a fractious face –
a smile guised as a grimace,
a grimace guised as a scowl,
a mouth left ajar when it should’ve been shut,
full of wrongful words
And Kashy and Est’bel and Tur’int and Lorenth,
each equally annoyed,
vowed to lay him low,
and lit black candles
in uneven rows
They knew each other not,
and worked their spells in separate lairs,
unbeknownst,
unleashing bucket-loads of badness
upon Banul’s greasy, unkempt head
But the bad tidal tidings of the witchly wave
overwhelmed the helm and washed away,
as the deluge dampened down, drowning
out itself,
canceling the curses,
as wrathful wraiths and spiteful spirits
collided in mid-aether,
and the imps imploded
as the nags scolded,
and the bad vibes didn’t jibe,
vexing the hexing
and refluxing the refractions
of the worrisome wavelengths,
weakening the wreaking wrathful bath
And the exoskeletal ectoplasm
of the shucked-off shades
created cast-off cloaks
cleansed of cursory conjurations
And Banul slipped into these
garnished garments,
warding off the chill,
and found uses for his bruises,
spawning scar tissue
tough as the leather armor owned
by warriors of yore
And the bay leaves he bought
at the grocery store and
scattered around his house
maybe helped a little
And Banul survived somehow
and soldiered on –
there by the grace –
and vowed to keep a straighter face
Copyright © Stanley Carter | Year Posted 2016
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