Starlet


1. Heroin[e]

The girl is
        dressed in pink with feather
                trim it is sectioned like
                borealis in verifiable
        cartography ---
At night she dreams of the little blue
                house on Grand where most have
                        wanted neon like rolling wires
                from the ground in crushing struggles
                begging it becomes a morning train-way
                        calculations made
                        a blank of needless signage
                                auroras
                                        of diesel and THE JETS
                        it grips her like salvation once was Pasadena
                               static in the small grey room
                of half-lit Revlon & her thin overpass
        to the precise 1.3948 hrs peace

2. Marilyn

BEHOLD! It's death and blooming
        roses; pink teacups
                from mother at an end;
        they scathe each fallen chain-
link fence while you, the schoolboy,
                watched her slither
        through smoke and satin; are flawless
as you felt it like electric lights. The one you love
                 has lit the stage; white teeth
        gravitations
         of dust & shimmer. Below her glitz
                you wait with promise
                     like
                star-struck rhythm descend
        the realms of broken
                                   chords --- divinations
                             of tequila
                         stillness and fluorescent dawn.

3. House of Fame

The sky begins to shift
                  like razor-wire
in rigid half-light -
                  clouds cut through
their grey to dark
                  windows and unsteady
street-signs, it's death
                  and nightly resurrection.
On East 10th St. she has lived
                  a life of Cherry Cola
with menthol slims.

     HOLLYWOOD 112 MILES

                    the door is closed
                                        behind her.
She knows
        something
                must happen. Cold light
      is blazing through
      the synapse of her skin.