Geer Austin | Bird of Paradise & October

Bird of Paradise

With green spears
crested orange flowers
& bird beaks
I’m a showoff
a show stopper
an in-your-face
specimen of a plant.
Some say I’m pushy
like a rooster, a brilliant
tropical thing screaming
my name at sunrise
keeping you from sleep.


__________________________

October

My face is a jack-o’-lantern a couple of days
before Halloween. The oak trees in my yard
bear 24-karat acorns; squirrels break their teeth
on them. I smell a cloudless blue sky, but it’s raining.
I’m staring at my laptop. Alan Cumming is trying
to sell me stuff on Instagram, but I’m not buying.
I can taste the money those gold acorns will bring me.
Okay, I can’t really taste money & acorns
aren’t palatable. So I munch a Macoun I bought
at a farmstand the next town over. My neighbor’s kid
tells me to chillax, but if I follow her advice I’ll forget
to vote. Her mother tells me about pif paf pouf. I say to her
this insane bench of stoicism is not a comfortable perch.
I ogle the orange blossoms that attracted hummingbirds
last summer. All of them have flown to Ecuador
where they work a gig entertaining tourists. I remember
their wings whirring next to my face while I read
novels on the deck. I always flew after them
as they rushed toward their next flower. But Chucky’s
saying that’s not true. What does he know?
A honey-drenched butternut squash opens its interior
for me. Cinnamon sweetness splats my taste buds
& I think about dinner at an agriturismo in Sicilia
one year ago. An acorn lands on my head & black squirrels
scramble up tree trunks. Pretty soon it will be November.


_______________________________________________


Geer Austin’s poetry and fiction have appeared in Poet Lore, Manhattanville Review, Big Bridge, Plenitude, BlazeVOX, Boog City, and others. His short story, “Stuart Livingston Hill,” is a recent episode of the podcast A Story Most Queer. He has served as a judge in the PEN America Prison Writing Awards and the Bisexual Book Awards. He is the author of Cloverleaf, a poetry chapbook (Poets Wear Prada). He lives in New York City.