ROCCO: Boy Child Poems from THE BOOK OF BREEDING by Samantha Barrow
H E W I L L R E M E M B E R N O N E O F T H I S
I call him Fatso
Little Rocco No-Neck
in my sweetest tones
like I am shaving
head to toe
the new pledge
who passed out
at my frat party
and filling his mouth
with whip cream
I wipe under his balls
pick his nose
pass him off to some nice
stranger so I can eat my dinner
with both hands
I put my boob in his mouth
I sing Baby Beluga again
and again
in funny accents
while bouncing
you swim so wild and you swim so free
Perhaps he will develop
an unflappable
aversion
to whale watching
S P O R T S C A R S
Fertility bounces up
over my nursing top
My nipples have moved
from object to subject
no longer the passive
gazed at, represented
spoken for, museumified, painted
unconsented ad reps for bottles
of Presidente, Mazdas
Gyros, Software, Baseball
They are action figures
themselves now
FIREWOMEN
come to squirt out hunger
thirst, loneliness
They talk back
speak when not spoken to
demand easy access
to the outside world
barely contained in this bra
with the one handed flip latch
They want to drive this convertible
with the top
DOWN
T H E U N B O R N
My name is Ruby
I am the one
who lost
I am the one
you flushed
I am Rocco’s twin sister
that will not happen
older?
younger?
we’ll never know
My name is Ruby
ironically so
Aunt Ruby, blood red
many facets
none possible
I am the dark shadow
in the corner of the dream
where the jolly jumper swung
empty to be reabsorbed
in the hollow
Rocco
swings and yanks, Rocco
laughs and jerks, Rocco
takes up all the space he needs
in the giant romper room
now his and his alone
Not enough room
for the two of us, BITCH
He—round-faced and red-blond
like a fat Conan O’Brien—
squealed like Beavis
as he kicked me
out
my teeth
already beginning to dream
of opening mouths and sinking
into bananas
jumped ship into his head
his jaw is filled
with little white pods
too many
too early
as I dissolve
pink
into the shadows
These poems are culled from an ongoing series titled The Book of Breeding, which will become an actual book in the future.
About the Author
Samantha Barrow writes poems and some prose while directing the Humanities in Medicine at the Sophie Davis School of Biomedical Education at The City College of New York, and teaching in the Program of Narrative Medicine at Columbia.
She is the author of GRIT and tender membrane (Plan B Press), Jelly (a chapbook, Tiger / Monkey Alliance), and Chap (self published). Her poetry, prose, reviews and interviews have been published in The Ledge Magazine, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Philadelphia City Paper, Off Our Backs, Lesbian Nation, Feminist Review, The Intima, Cleaver, Helmet Hair and two Uphook Press Anthologies: “you say. say.” and “Hell Strung and Crooked.
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