Persistence of Memory

by Esto Banga

Here on Jackie's coffee table
there is a book of paintings by
Salvador Dali a dead
Spanish painter who went insane
after waxing his longhorn
moustache with crazy glue to
a mirror for twelve days
while standing in two bowls of
chunky chicken soup

he's got one called
Persistence of Memory
in which some plastic watches
are melting on their tables
late in July somewhere in
Utah or we could guess
Spanish Utah
maybe eight years before the Spaniards
discovered steel watches and
stopped leaving them outside under
about a kazillion birds
or flying IRS agents with
no love for art at all

one of the watches rides a long dead
fish like a saddle which is Salvador's
way of saying that in Spain
time is a drooling cowboy who traded
his crumbly steed Elmo for a flounder
after some tequila spit card game
with five dope merchants
in the back of a jimmy van
and later puked out hard years of
stored up lonesome songs
that he gave to chocolate Juanita
who had a furry baby in a
rag paper blanket

and one of the watches is hanging
in a tree being left there
to dry out and this is saying
we are all being left in a tree
to dry out while time dances
somewhere else with someone
else's wife for someone else's
money maybe someday we'll be
someone else but not before
time rolls over in its sleep
and dreams of tall grass
lemon meringue pie
and naked snatch halfway
to Spanish Utah

and one of the watches is
slipping over the edge of the table
because no one noticed
it was telling time
better than expected given the
general lack of consideration
these days for good time keeping
or a really honest watch

its got a spider on its face
a reminder about personal hygiene
or a deep message to management
look fellows the poor spiders are
bigger than the rich spiders
and there are more of them and
a lot of poor fat Spanish spiders
are lined up behind the donut boxes
just waiting their turn

like this last watch
which is face down in the dirt
it died saluting its country
or maybe got pissed on by
its girl friend
a black widow named
Bethjean who wears a wool hat
and smells sweet like some rat poison

and on its back a
whole platoon of just
regular ants some
doing a square dance
some running numbers for
an ant boss with cigars in
both mouths
some wearing tight pants
for giggly ant girls with
exciting ant bulges
the ants can smell them even
in Spain

then off in the distance you
can see the rock of Gibraltar
just like it was when Columbus
a man with a fairly bad complexion
and a pushy personality
sailed off to discover South Carolina
and claim it for the Spaniards
and call it the New World
even though it had been there
all along
waiting like a
rubber movie monster
for Salvador
to come in a melting watch ship
and paint on the Old World
all over again

-- EB
©2001 Esto Banga