A RIBALD DIALOGUE (Conversations with Stick Series #10)

A RIBALD DIALOGUE

Little difference between these scenarios, eh, Stick?
The Post writes about a gory machete-hacking down
the road. A ménage a trois ends in beheading a lover.

All depends on who or what or why one is a “lover”
and get decapitated in a quite quiet neighbourhood
where news of mating felines and hounddogs shock.

The catbird chasing another while its tweetums
perches nonchalantly on a dead branch is de rigueur,
like a cut from a film noir where lust gets lustre

when mayhem climaxes in an undeserved carnage
and reportage labels it a jealous rage of a cuckold.
Why can’t they just get along? Enough love to go around.

But it’s cold outside. One cannot surrender the warmth
of one’s bed to another and still be the same tomorrow.
Ah, an axiom here: to every catbird belongs a catbird.

Shut up, Stick. The silence of pursuit here is riveting.

—Albert B. Casuga
06-13-11

Prompt: It’s cold—in the mid-50s. One catbird sits at the end of a dead limb overlooking the yard while her mate chases a rival, all in silence. ---Dave Bonta, The Morning Porch, 06-13-11