KENYON HEIGHTS

http://kenyonheights.com/

Here’s where I live—

The Kenyon Heights

Retirement Home in

Emporia, Kansas

It’s on a hill—

West of town where

The College of Emporia

Used to be ensconced

They’ve restored and—

Remodeled the stately

Administration Building

Just for us retirees

I was born in Newman’s—

Across the street from C of E

There on Twelfth Avenue West

In the hospital there

Roberta’s grandfather—

Doctor F. A. Eckdall

Delivered yours truly

Into this wicked world

Now I live there—

Across the street at

Kenyon Heights not

Far from Maplewood

I live in a nice cheap—

Single bedroom apartment

My lovely next door neighbor

Miss Anita B. Rice

She looks at me—

When we meet in the

Hallway, remarking:

“I’m simply APPALLED!”

Walter and Jenny

Growing up in the country—

West of Emporia like Connie

Leonhart & Bobbie Ann Kyle

Out there on old Hwy 50

I could still feel the Depression—

A motel lot next door with an

Old lady there since the Thirties

The way things used to be

Funny how history changes—

So many of the farms and

Prairie communities gone now

Ghost towns & decaying ruins

Corporation-run farming—

Satellites beaming down to

Spaceship John Deere robots

On where to spray & harvest

Even downtown Emporia—

Turning into a ghost town too

Boarded-up businesses and

Flint Hills Mall north of town

Some things are saved tho—

The Granada Theater, EHS,

Lowther and Kenyon Heights

Restoration and renewal

All the ruins in Europe—

When William Allen White

Was over there did he think

It would ever happen here?

It’s lucky I had grandparents—

To connect me with the past

To give me a feel for what’s

Slipping through my fingers

Call me stupidly nostalgic—

But I just simply can’t help it

Jenny the G. A .R. Queen Bee

Her father a Union colonel

Pounding on the old piano—

Playing “John Brown’s Body”

Down in the basement there

In Senator Plumb’s Mansion

All the little old ladies—

Having their church socials

Me behind the curtains stuffing

Myself with lemon-meringue pies

BOYHOOD BILDUNGSROMAN

Once upon a time—

Back when I was a kid

Growing up west of town

On Old Highway 50

Long before new Hwy 50—

And Interstate 335 the old

Thirties Depression highway

Past my mother’s home

My grandfather was a—

County commissioner who

Didn’t last very long since

He didn’t take bribes

Bridge and road contracts—

Could be very lucrative for

Town officials on the take

But Walter Larken wasn’t

I’d wake up way out—

There on my grandparent’s

Place listening to the lonely

Doodlebug late at night

The Santa Fe tracks—

Shiny in the moonlight

Down south of us calling

To me late in the night

Boyhood RFD memories—

Smell of cattle shit east

Whiffing from the nearby

Anderson feed lots

Emporia a cattle-town—

Tall grass prairie running

All the way to Strong City

Lonely Z Bar Ranch nights

It was during the war—

My pilot father in Europe

My mother living on base

Me with my grandparents

Now they’re all gone—

The Santa Fe train station

No longer there, just the

Steel rails east & westward

Lone Rider of the Santa Fe

“I write cheap novelettes”

—Graham Greene, The Third Man

____________________

Funny how things work out—

Perhaps parody would be a

Better word to use I suppose

I owe my life to a cattle town—

There by the Santa Fe tracks

Back where I was born

____________

Years later now here I am—

I owe my life to a young calf’s

Valve there inside my heart

A computed tomography—

(CT) scan was imaging me

The murmur on the screen

______________

The surgeon said to me:

“And this is what we call a

Kansas sky, my friend”

My heart was all stormy—

Tornadoes swirled in the sky

Dark vortexes of turbulence

________________

I didn’t tell him that I was—

A Kansas kid from down there

In the stormy Fly Over State

My left ventral had blown—

Its gasket and my whole system

Was going down the tube

___________

Open-heart surgery fast—

The little calf’s valve is still

Beating away inside me

Each beat a reminder that—

I was born in Kansas and that

Kansas saved my life as well

______________

I’m just a Lone Rider now—

Lone Rider of the Santa Fe with

My own Z Bar Ranch inside me

It’s just a cheap novelette—

A pulp fiction Cowboy Western

My life a parody in slow motion

_________________

Weak heroes & sympathetic villains—

Dominate what used to be my story

But now it all seems so mock-heroic

All those cool matinee movies—

There in the Granada Theater during

The hot Kansas summer afternoons

___

Reminding me of Alida Valli as—

Anna in Graham Greene’s film noir

“The Third Man” (1949)

My whole concept of "hero"—

Once a part of the male domain

So patriarchal and phallocentric

________________

But now it fails to comply with—

Stereotypical Old Western pulp

Fiction storylines anymore

The real Lone Rider of Santa Fe—

Beating slowly away in my chest

Why did Kansas save me?

The Leopard Man

THE LEOPARD MAN (1943)

__________________

The Leopard Man

The Cemetery Scene

Kiss of The Panther Woman

Expert Witness

Magic Realism

__________________

The Leopard Man

Killer Mexican film noir —

The perfect ode de cologne

The sweet scent of death

Scary Val Lewton —

Creepy Jacques Tourneur

RKO Femme fatales of film!!!

Clicking Castanets —

Cemeteries late at night

Death in the Dead of Night

Dark Forties Suspense —

Endless Sinister Suspicions

Who’s gonna get it next?    

_______________

The Cemetery Scene

The best scene —

In the whole scary movie

Some queens think

The jilted young lover —

Stood up by her boyfriend

Stuck with all the dead stiffs

Locked in the cemetery —

Darkness creeping into the

Deepening deadly denouement

Gaunt Graveyard Statues —

Leering down at the poor thing

Waiting for the stealthy Killer

__________________

Kiss of The Panther Woman

Stalked by the fiendish —

Black Panther of Death

No girl is safe, honey

But not everything —

Tiptoeing on cat’s feet is

A little innocent Kitty-cat

Defenseless cuties —

Are tres Vulnerable as

Killers prowl the night

Half the Thrill —

Being a Killer at night

Your Stalking noir footsteps

_________________

Expert Witness

What makes a Witness —

Expert while testifying

At a Murder Trial?

The erudite, all-knowing —

Dr. Galbraith played by James

Bell in The Leopard Man?

How calm cerebral —

The pipe-smoking professor

Of the local Museum?

The least one you’d —

Suspect as a Killer yet so

Knowingly cold-bloodied

_________________

Magic Realism

Just ask Miss Marquez —

That primal noir image:

Blood flowing under the door

The Unseen Murder —

The scream behind the bolted

Locked door, then the Blood

The thud of the thug —

The young daughter sliced

And diced so horribly bloody

The Unseen Murder —

Hidden from Us Viewers

There on the Other Side

I Walked With A Zombie

I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE (1943)

_______________________ 

I Walked with a Zombie

Zombie Badboyz

Darby Jones

Drums in the Night

_____________________ 

I Walked With A Zombie 

I lived with a whole town —

Of Living Dead Kansas Zombies

It was worse than LA Zombieville

Night of the Living Dead —

Just a tacky, trashy reminder

Of the Living Dead in Kansas

Especially the tall handsome —

Naked Zombie Boyz there in

The cane fields at night

Hoodoo Voodoo drums —

The heartbeat of the Living Dead

Beating them off in the moonlight

__________________

Zombie Badboyz

Jacques Tourneur’s —

Queen Bee Horror classic

Still so chillingly Sexy

Poor Sandra Dee sucked —

Into Cumly Carib Film Noir

Just like Innocent me

Hoodoo Voodoo in Kansas —

Pretty much the same thing

Ever sucked a zombie off?

________________

Darby Jones

Hear those beating, throbbing —

Voodoo drums tonight, honey?

I know I once did, my dear. . .

The Moon high overhead —

The twisting tall Canefield path

The crossroads guarding secrets

Voodoo ceremonies late at night —

But first I had to pass the test

Going down on Darby Jones

So tall, hung and handsome —

The whites of his upturned eyes

Placating his Living Dead Penis

_____________________

Drums In The Night

Voodoo drums beating —

African gods dancing haughtily

In both Haiti & Kansas too!!!

Up there in the balcony —

In the Granada’s “Nigger Heaven”

Doing the hot zombies, honey

My knees stuck to the —

Sticky Pepsi Cola floor

Getting reamed inside-out

I was nothing but —

A no-good little Emporia

Slut of the Voodoo Night!!!

DEAD RINGER

_______________

Ding Dong Blues

The Bird Bridge

Murder Ordained

Praise the Lord

Dead Ringer

Trashy Hollywood

_______________

Ding Dong Blues

A sure sign —

Of the changing times

When Hostess Twinkies

Gets outta town!!!

Time moves on —

Even though I got the

Ding Dong Blues

But what can you do?

Bankruptcies and —

Liquidations across

This fair land of

American opportunity?

Will Emporia end up —

Like dead decaying

Modern day Detroit

Ghost Town USA?

_______________

The Bird Bridge

Down from up there —

The Sunken Gardens on

Twelfth Avenue where cute

College boys smooch

Past The Granada Theater —

Down along Commercial

All the way to Sixth Avenue

Running East and West

All the way down —

Past the Santa Fe and

Burlington Tracks

Steel rails in the night

Down to Sodom’s Grove —

Cottonwood River Bridge

Follow the country road

Down to The Bird Bridge

_______________

Murder Ordained

A new updated version —

A made-for-TV gothic

Neo-noir flick shocking the

Small town Emporians

What could be worse —

For The Religious Right

Than a Lutheran minister

Killing his lovely Wife?

Bashing her head in —

Throwing her off some

Rickety old country bridge

Down into The River?

_______________

Praise the Lord

Smashing her head in —

Her bloody fingers clutching

The old bridge railing before

Falling down into The Drink?

Let us Praise the Lord!!! —

Sing Hymns to Matrimony!!!

The worst Kansas Killers are

ORDAINED FOR MURDER!!!

An Adulterous Adam —

In a Kansas Garden of Eve

Killing his own Wife with a

Cheap Bottle of Jacques Bonet

_______________

Dead Ringer

Lorna Anderson returns home —

After serving time in the Big House

For murdering her poor husband

Religious Emporia simply shocked!!!

In this new louche Hollywood —

Made-for-TV remake of the tragic

Original murder there in lovely

God-fearing Bible Belt Emporia

“What a fucking dump!” —

Exclaims Bette Davis exhumed

From the grave especially to play

Killer Lorna Anderson again

_______________

Trashy Hollywood

Joan Crawford plays —

Poor cripple Reverend Bird

Stuck in a wheelchair up

There in the lonely Attic

In this Cabaret version —

Of “Dead Ringer” in Drag

The Granada gets to do

Grande Dame Guignol!!!

A Kansas Burlesque —

That says it all and more

A Lutheran Minister in drag

Lorna as Dyke Transvestite!!!

Murder Ordained

MURDER ORDAINED

______________________ 

Hush, Hush Sweet Lorna

Gothic Groanings

Hollywood Hauntings

The Granada Theater Knows

Lorna Tells All

The Emporia Gazette

Midwestern Noir Muse

Deconstructing the Fly-Over State

Escaping Emporia

Returning Home

______________________

 

Hush, Hush Sweet Lorna 

As Sandy Bird fell —

Downward off the Rocky Ford

Bridge into the murky waters

Of the dark Cottonwood River

Falling down in slow motion —

Down from the old cables and

Gothic girders silhouetted by

The cruel Kansas starlight

Leaving bloody handprints —

Clutching the stark railings

Staining the whole Granada

Grande Dame Guignol Movie

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Gothic Groanings

There in the putrid pews —

In the shadowy sanctimonious

Aisles of the Baptist Church

Where murder was ordained

Blessed by the congregation —

Preached by the gaunt gothic

Minister who turned Emporia

Into a TV murder mystery

Like “Dead Ringer” (1964) —

“Strait–Jacket” (1964) and

“Lady in a Cage” (1964)

The list going on & on

“Die! Die! My Darling!” —

“I Saw What You Did!” (1965 )

“Queen of Blood” (1966) and

“Whoever Slew Auntie Roo?”

_________________

Hollywood Hauntings

Not to mention others —

“Frightmare” (1974) and

“A Knife for the Ladies”

Plus “Blood and Lace”

“The Killing Kind” (1973) —

“Cry of the Banshee” and

“That Cold Day in the Park”

Plus “Night Warning”

As well as “In Cold Blood” —

“Queen of Blood” (1966)

“Berserk,” and yes

 “Hush, Hush Sweet Lorna!”

Gimme some Grande Dame —

Guignol Cinema and I’ll give

You an American goth flick

Worthy of wasted Emporia!

_________________

The Granada Theater Knows

“Come in, Madame Capote! —

Suave smooth Soothsayer and

Famed Kansas Clairvoyante of

“In Cold Blood” Psychic Powers!

The Granada Theater is packed —

All the way to the crowded Balcony

With Halloween Trick or Treat

Emporians eager for Cheap Thrills!

All the town’s staid churches —

Are boycotting the Cinema Séance

Delving into the Dirty Secrets

From whence Bird Bridge flowed

“Oh, Authoress of Cold Blood! —

Oh, Great Emporia Enchantress!

Give us the Holcomb Down-low

On louche Lorna’s Love Life!!!

_________________

Lorna Tells All

"Commune with us, tonight —

Sweet Sister of Sin and Sorrow

Confess your Skanky Secrets

Bring on the Dark Shadows!”

“Speak American Goth Spirit! —

Read our Red State Beads!

Tell us all the Wretched Secrets!

About the Rats in the Cellar!”

“Aghast and totally Disgusting —

Tell us about The Bad Seed!

From whence flows all our tacky

Fly Over State Fuck Up’s!!!

“Tell us a Goth Ghost Story —

Befitting our Midwestern Noir

Skeletons in the Dark Closet!

What goes Bump in the Night!!!”

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The Emporia Gazette

Soon the Emporia Gazette —

Began gossiping like the tacky

Scandal-Rag National Enquirer

Telling the most horrible Tales

Small town idyllic Emporia —

Once used to sleepy streets

And elm-shaded neighborhoods

Safely hidden from prying eyes

Suddenly turning into a louche—

Lorna Anderson Murder Mystery

TV Show that would’ve simply

Shocked poor William Allen White!

“Hush! Hush! Sweet Lorna!” —

The Gazette Headlines Hissed

“What Ever Happened to Poor

Sandy Bird?” Emporia asked

________________

Midwestern Noir Muse

I have this Midwest noir —

Muse whispering inside my

Midnight movies dreams

Haunting me late at night

I simply can’t help it —

I blame Raymond Chandler

And Mickey Spillane as well

Plus campy noir Miss Capote

But most of all I suppose —

That old Yoknapathawpa queen

Miss Faulkner deserves most

Of the shameless noir blame

Deep South Delta Dixie —

Decadence rotten to the core

Mildewing just like my tacky

Midwestern noir existence!!!

________________

Deconstructing the Fly-Over State

Funny how things work out —

In ways you’d never expect things

To work their way through the

Nefarious detours & divagations

I’m more open to it now it seems—

Once I got used to being down on

My knees in the gutter looking up

At the heavenly stars above

Pretending to be hoity-toity about—

Being way up there above it all

Looking down at the Fly Over State

From a lofty jet plane high above

Suddenly I was born again it seems—

Plopped down like a runny juicy tacky

Cow patty from the haughty sky above

All the way down to Midwestern noir

___________________

Escaping Emporia

Thomas Wolfe seems somewhat—

Misguided to me when he says in his

“Look Homeward Angel” that we can’t

Ever return back Homeward again?

It’s just the opposite for me—

I tend to think that we can

Never actually leave our dumpy

Homes ever at all, my dears!

We’re stuck with it forever—

It’s embedded deep in our

Dizzy devolving head like being

Helplessly born Middle Class slobs

What makes us run away?—

We run from ourselves madly

Helter skelter but unfortunately

There’s simply No Escape at all

____________________

Returning Home

Nostalgia for me ends up—

Being nothing more than a touchy

Migraine headache that simply

Doesn’t want to go away

I’ve got the Granada Theater—

The Strand and the 50-S Drive In

Playing movies for me all the time

Up there inside my balcony head

Old film palaces haunt me—

Decaying decrepit abandoned

Haunts like all those gone movie

Theaters in dying dead Detroit

My only consolation being—

The Bijou Matinees still playing

On summer Saturday afternoons

There inside my Valentino heart

Mayor of Mudville

“Bobbi is three days older than dirt.”

— Former Gazette Lifestyles Editor

and reporter Lea Markowitz Ringler

The pinched, worried look—

Of a small town Kansas mayor

Seems to pretty much say it all

Mayor Bobbi Mlynar and I—

Both graduated from EHS

Way back in 1962

Lovely little Emporia-

Former Athens of the Midwest

Pretty much a ghost town now

Returning to its roots—

An agricultural retirement

Town full of aging Wrinklies

Mayor Mlynar’s career—

Stints with The Gazette and

The local Funeral Home

Now the esteemed Mayor—

Of a much larger Burial

Bye Bye Sunflower State

Fly Over State

“Beware of the man

who urges an action

in which he bears

no responsibility”

—William Allen White

Elected to the Emporia—

City Commission and the

Mayor of Mudville USA

Madame Mlynar lacks—

Any hidden influences

Over City business

Serving selflessly—

She garnishes no

Financial benefits

She gives stirring—

Welcoming speeches &

Kisses Rodeo Cowboys

She recently appeared—

Quite cheerfully at the

Hostess Twinkie Strike!!!