This week in the PEN Poetry Series, guest editor Heather Christle features five poems by Rachel B. Glaser. About Glaser’s work, Christle writes: “If I could rent a room in Rachel B. Glaser’s mind I would, but until developers finish working on Google HeadLet, these poems will have to do. Roommates: the kids you went to school with, God, porn stars, snakes. Decor: comfortable, kind of a mess. In her first poetry collection, MOODS, Glaser wrote ‘I’m a feminist, I said to his pillow / That means I get two orgasms and you get one,’ and you’ll find this kind of pleasure-seeking bravado throughout her work. Sometimes you’ll find lines detailing a desire not for sex, but for revenge, or for the banishment of another. No matter which appetite Glaser’s poems seek to satisfy, they do so with gusto, humor, intelligence, and style.”

 

Those woman woman man threesomes in porn

look like a group homework assignment
goofing off in someone’s house
one person doing something that looks like work 
but is really pretty easy
like one woman is just braiding the hair 
of the woman being penetrated
or two women are licking the dick of the man in a way 
that would take centuries for him to come
the boobs get extra attention
and the balls
there are extra hands
three tongues
whatever spell they can sometimes spin 
on someone they seduce
they can’t do now
they lose themselves in the work
and pleasure
like astronauts in harmony
or they sulk within their poses
like teens at a party
they see a mouth and kiss it
they find themselves in precarious positions
and doubt this could turn on a stranger
Jesse’s pubes end up in their mouth
they’ve never seen nipples like Korinne’s
they forget if Anne came 
I touch the dick like it’s all dicks
I’ve got an appointment later at the vet’s
but Korinne makes me forget
she’s tired and touching boobs only
Jesse doesn’t know when to stop
I see him hesitate
paralyzed by indecision
I whisper to him
from my place near his crotch
take Korinne from behind
and I’ll crawl over there and kiss her
or I’ll just lay underneath her
and be kissed

 

Tragic Snoopys

shriveled Snoopy
bent or dented Snoopy 
burnt Snoopys 
deflated Snoopys 
shredded Snoopys
grilled Snoopy
stained Snoopys
mushed Snoopy 
bloated Snoopys 
shards of Snoopy in the street
shaved Snoopys
rusted Snoopy
overgrown Snoopys 
oily Snoopys at the bottom of the barrel
cracked and leaking Snoopy
the boiled Snoopy I saw in Russia
diced Bulgarian Snoopy
the corroded Snoopy on 8th st. 
matted Snoopy 
lumpy Snoopy 
coma Snoopy
boxed Snoopy
scratched or bleeding Snoopy
Siamese Snoopy
hugely fat Snoopy
stick-thin Snoopy
the bratty, imposter Snoopy
scorned half-made Snoopys
sickly Snoopy
goopy Snoopy
hairless Snoopy
gluey Snoopy
melted Snoopy
pile-of-Snoopy
the dried eyes of Snoopy under glass
cheap Snoopy imitation on the television
ancient Snoopys sold instead of studied
a dazed half-alive Snoopy
premature Snoopys
stale Snoopys
splintering Snoopys 
Snoopys with the tread worn off
Snoopys with the light gone out
with the heart not in
a clicking sound
a wind-up tail
a detailed Snoopy
puffy CGI Snoopy
nuclear glow Snoopy
pimped out Snoopy
and this is not Snoopy at all
Snoopy doesn’t have a bell
or any fins
that is not Snoopy’s coiled hair
Snoopy’s metal screw
the flag is not from Snoopy
the shoe doesn’t fit Snoopy
look, it’s the Snoopy from your high school
condemned Snoopy
illegal Snoopy
dripping Snoopy in the church basement
Snoopy slime scrubbed from the retaining wall
shellacked Snoopy on the walking bridge
twisted Snoopy in the turbine
I remember the last Snoopy in the marsh
and the one we passed in the car
a hawk carrying Snoopy into the sky

 

Pet snake

I’ve always wanted a pet snake
to love only me
a poisonous snake from Egypt and Asia
who eats sand and spits ants

if you were mean I’d get my snake
it hates who I hate
Becky from Science
the man from the mini mart

my sly alien snake
wicked coil of life

my snake would scare away cops
if they came bothering Mama and me
when we are dancing to our records
high off something Ricky gave us

 

The Zack River
 

it moves really fast
has both turtles and frogs
it sometimes has poop in it
just kidding
it never has trash in it
God loves it
no one ever drowns in it
it’s easy going
it’s a cool hangout
adults don’t get it
once a cowboy drank from it
once an alien visited it
it won best river in 2008

 

The mess

watching you fall in love

like a glob of honey dripping down the spoon

a frog stepping off a lily pad

snowflakes accumulate on the sill

it’s maddening

you wist about like a sand castle crumbling in the wind

a flower twisting in bloom

you dawdle with time 

you

I should swat you

Clean up this mess!

This honey!

The lake water!

Sand in my mouth!

Filth!

 

Once a week, the PEN Poetry Series publishes work by emerging and established writers from coast to coast. Subscribe to the PEN Poetry Series mailing list and have poems delivered to your e-mail as soon as they are published (no spam, no news, just poems).