Diana Darby ** "I V" ** Intravenous

Dead Birds and Garlic

This is important,
like working hard
or beans with garlic.
I know,
you think you’ve heard it before.
Cheap nest
and dead birds,
and wallpaper with little roses on it
no one wants to pull down.
But this is different.
This is Hollywood.
You know,
Tinseltown.
The Biz.
This is where it all happens.
The sand and the glamour.
Silicone valleys and breasts.
Old women with shopping carts living in Santa Monica,
riddled by the sun,
still clutching their eight by ten glossies in their hands
while reciting lines to imaginary casting directors.
I know,
one of them lived in my laundry room.
She used to pee in the sink.
I’d come in and find her sitting in an old metal chair
with her face painted up like an insane clown.
Black clothes and ripped stockings on her feet,
wreaking of urine.
She’d tell me she was here for the reading.
“What reading?”, I’d say
“Gone with the Wind,” she’d gurgle.
“Oh," I’d say, “they’re casting for that next door.”