Andrew Cox

From Me Far Off, with Others All Too Near

Shakespeare, Sonnet 61

Too much excitement for one day wonders where
That laughing is coming from and when an afternoon nap
Will come home from its morning of secret errands

Far off a briefcase walks into a solid state building
And let’s the elevator take it up to the floor
Where what waits has an extra Y chromosome

Others all too near are on their way to meet
Long hair and a pierced nose for an afternoon of fun
Where clothes have a life of their own

And now the shoes and purse swallow the pill
That makes everything ok while the gold chain
Places a bet on who has the whitest teeth

Laughter saunters up the street confident that no one
Knows where it’s been or what it’s been doing

Lilies that Fester Smell Far Worse than Weeds

Shakespeare, Sonnet 94

Small talk found itself without a date
And everyone is disappointed in slow dances
Yet the music had all these ducks in a row
And the fake waterfall dumps its load over the cliff
The tattoos on ankles and diamonds in pierced ears
Rode to the party in limousines with black windows
While small talk stays in with home movies
And an urge to think about what happened

So this is where I take you somewhere different
Somewhere where the looming above your head
Presses down until you wonder what it is
You are supposed to hold up and why you care
And how it is small talk came to the forefront
Of everything you believed went wrong

Andrew Cox is the author of The Equation that Explains Everything (BlazeVOX 2010) and the chapbook Fortune Cookies (2River 2009). He lives in University City, Missouri, where he edits the UCity Review. contact