Wunderkind Muzak Consultant

Icons denatured to a date nut,
it’s jicama and savant
if you want oldies
orchestrating your A&P,
yesteryear piped through kabob. 

A shelf stocker asks what the prodigy barters,
worries my gift for numbing is teendom
through the Venn of cold cuts,
her boxes artisaned to doppelgäng a gorge.  

Core the medley and you have a Garfunkel elevator.

I’ve heard of slumber parties.
I can’t tell you their sound.

Contrasts, with Prom Ending

The casket maker sponsors a charity run
with crib factory,

queer theorists shop for a heteronormative
coat of paint. The nihilist

cobblestones their wishing well, Marlboro
Man never the e-cig same.

Prayer bobbins crochet an atheist’s sewing kit,
smock exchange for pinnacle tabernacle.

Orchid polemic—the corsage derivative of fleece.

Belated Cosmetologist

Greetings from my grandma’s house,
saloon doors to the half-bath.  

Penny rollers marked the receipt book,
finger acids stripped the timer

from pearl to pawn-white.
Nearing ninety-five she changed

the beauty salon to an apartment,
cot-grafted the casters. Her customers,
home visitors and glamor klatch.

Ashes, spread on a centennial farm.

Aerosol of Mrs. Adamczyk.
Hairdryer for Mrs. Janowiac.
The supply room’s shampoo-caulked crack.  

Jonathan Riccio is a queer writer who serves as a contributing interviewer for the University of Arizona Poetry Center's 1508 blog. His collections Agoreography and Eye, Romanov are forthcoming from 3: A Taos Press and SurVision Books. He received his PhD from the University of Southern Mississippi.

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