ESCAPE FROM EMPORIA

Hometown Girl

The YMCA

Peter Pan Park

Roberts-Blue-Barnett

Strong City

William Allen White Library

The Sunken Garden

South of the Tracks

Hometown Girl

“I think of you often”

—D. A. Powell

“Cherry Blossoms in Spring,”

Useless Landscape

One thing I learned from—

My mother’s divorce & 2 marriages

Was that sex was pretty much—

Highly overrated in our small town

Emporia was just a Peyton Place—

So what else was there to do?

But get drunk at the VFW—

Dance & smoke all weekend long?

Her second marriage to a young—

Stud from Olpe was a total wreck

If the Ship’s Lounge could only—

Talk about hanky-panky adultery

No wonder I shunned str8ts and—

Turned into an inveterate drag queen

Climbing that Stairway To Heaven—

All the way up, down on my knees!!!

The YMCA

“where many a shallow

boy got dumped”

—D. A. Powell

“Cherry Blossoms in Spring,”

Useless Landscape

All the way down along—

Shady Constitution Street

Past the Baptist Church—

Where Coach Smith grew up

His father in the old photos—

EHS basketball team 1937

Past EHS and Lowther—

That’s where the YMCA was

A chance to swim nude—

Erect in the turbulent pool

Where the wrestling team—

Turned me into an S & M queen

Pinned by Arnoldo Lopez—

I was his screamy Lupe Velez

Peter Pan Park

“in this indifferent orchard”

—D. A. Powell

“Cherry Blossoms in Spring,”

Useless Landscape

Past Sixth Avenue down—

All the way to the City Pool

Where George Wathen—

Lifeguard stud sneered at me

He had my number—

As I X-rayed his big crotch

I needed it really bad—

Lotsa artificial respiration

Peter Pan Park at night—

Cruising Monkey Island tricks

Getting picked up late—

There by the Tennis Courts

Roberts-Blue-Barnett

“there’s almost

nothing to go back to”

—D. A. Powell

“Cherry Blossoms in Spring,”

Useless Landscape

I’ve gone back and—

Pieced it all together again

The wide flat streets—

Full of cool elm afternoons

Down State Street—

Past the Hood Mansion

Where Miss Howard—

The Spanish teach lived

Down past Roberts-Blue—

Where cute Jimmy Barnett lived

Lotsa business, my dear—

For Peyton Place stiffs

Strong City

“wild forms are with us

always, though fleeting”

—D. A. Powell

“End of Days,”

Useless Landscape

He waited for me—

After school in his pick-up

His blue corduroy FFA jacket—

His shit-kickin cowboy boots

By the time we got to—

The Z Bar Ranch it was late

He was a young rancher’s son—

His father was filthy rich

After a six-pack of Coors—

He’d bang his head back hard

Against the Chevy’s gun-rack—

The country station on the radio

He taught me everything there was—

To know about animal husbandry

William Allen White Library

“It wasn’t only Amtrak

pulling trains at night”

—D. A. Powell

“Chicken,”

Useless Landscape

Before Amtrak showed up—

And Burlington-Northern

The Santa Fe Railroad—

Pretty much ran the town

That’s where you worked—

After graduating from EHS

I went to KSTC instead—

And became a prim Librarian

The stacks back then my home—

The William Allen White Library

Art deco Senate Apartments—

Kitty-corner across the street

Inheriting from my parents—

That place on Constitution St

Miss Havisham goth recluse—

Giving up on Great Expectations

The Sunken Garden

“I only give you back

what you imagine”

—D. A. Powell

“The Fluffer Talks of Eternity,”

Useless Landscape

Just call me poor Alma—

In that Tennessee Williams play

“Summer and Smoke” evenings—

There in the Sunken Garden

It was a lot more sunken—

Back then in the late Fifties

Lots of bushes and privacy—

For those in the know

That’s where I got to meet—

Grown-up guys from Kansas City

Like that handsome young salesman—

Alma met in the park that night

I got to meet some myself—

Lonely students far away from home

Ghostly gothic Norton Hall—

Looming down disapproving of me

South of the Tracks

“The state, begun as a series

of missions, used native men

& women as cheap labor”

—D. A. Powell

“Seven Sketches for a

Landscape, Unfinished”

Useless Landscape

The Santa Fe Railroad—

Employed 200 Mexican-Americans

With documentation dating—

Back to 1907 from Old Mexico

They worked the yards and tracks—

In return, living in little brick houses

"Las Casitas" known as “La Colonia”—

Owned by the Santa Fe railroad

South of the tracks on the north—

Side of South Avenue at Arundel Street

I remember feeling sorry for—

John Rangel and the other Hispanics

When Wood Bloxom would get into—

His racist rants about minorities

They didn’t have a chance—

The old grizzled Gargoyle would opine

The same with women who dared—

To show their intelligence over men

He hated Merit Scholarship winners—

Especially the young girls in class

He’d been teaching since the ‘30s—

The same old Euclidian stuff forever

The football players yawned while—

His sage Voice droning on and on…

Fly-Over State

Fly-Over State

“Everything in
one direction”
—Sylvia Plath

It’s like being emailed—
Into Outer Space somewhere

It’s a one-way Trip—
And there’s No Return

The Westering Experience—
Petered out a century ago

Ole Edvart Rølvaag—
Trying to capture the Push

His Giants of the Earth—
Those Norwegian Emigrants

Dying of a heart attack—
Early in his mid-Fifties

Along with the Germans—
Welch, Dutch, Irish, Czechs

While jets Fly-Over now—
Not even looking down

Fly Over State

Fly Over State

I used to think—

I hated them all

But now I see that

I just hated myself

I hated myself—

For trying to fit into

A tacky small-town

Cartoon Cowtown

Stuck by the tracks—

The Anderson Feed Lots

Then Iowa Beef stench

Later Tyson’s Inc.

____________

Former Santa Fe depot—

A fattening-up Zone

For the slaughter later

In Chicago & Kansas City

It used to be just—

The smell of cow-shit

Drifting outta the shitty

Anderson Feed Lots

But later on—

They started butchering

Them on the spot with

Iowa Beef busy at work

_____________

The putrid smell—

Of money they said

Made up for the stench

Of Auschwitz Inc.

The Big Money—

Shifted from Beef to

Chicken when chic

Tyson Co. moved in

Phil Fleming smiled—

The rest of the gang

Grinned, it was the

Smell of Big Time Bucks

_____________

If you caught a whiff—

Of it downwind it was

Putrid enough to make

You wanna Vomit

And so the little—

Athens of the Midwest

Turned into the Armpit

Of the fuckin Universe

I got outta town—

While the getting’ was

Good without looking

Back or saying goodbye

____________

C of E folded then—

KSTC kept things going

Producing Breeders to

Spread the Disease

Wal-Fart moved in—

Bankrupting downtown

It used to be the little

Athens of the Midwest

Now it’s a Ghost Town—

Red State Kansas deluxe

Ultra-Right Republicans

Get their Fly Over State

Bad Seed

Bad Seed (1956)

“An ideal housewife begins

to suspect her loving adolescent

daughter may be a heartless killer.”

______________________

Who needed a movie—

Or even lewd porno flicks

From evil Kansas City?

When I led the life of—

Nancy Kelly there in small

Town “Imporia” back then

That misspelled sign—

Outside Olpe on Hwy 99

Was the Story of my Life

______________

I had my hands full—

And my greedy little mouth

Full of the Real Thing, honey

Ronnie was on my mind—

Day in and day out, he was

The only thing that mattered

There’s nothing like being—

Gob-smacked outta the blue

Struck by a bolt of lightening

______________

That’s what happened to me—

It still seems like it was just

Yesterday that I succumbed

Falling down on my knees—

I simply couldn’t help myself

Bad Seed was my Downfall

It wasn’t very pretty—

In fact it was the ugliest

Thing in the whole world!!!

_________________

Who would’ve thought—

Sullen pouty Ronnie had

A King Kong down there?

He let me see it back—

Then in the Seventh Grade

In Lowther Junior High

We were basket-boys—

For Mr. Bowie’s gym class

We took showers early

_______________

So that we could do the—

Towel and basket routine

For the rest of the mob

I was simply shocked—

How could a skinny little

Elvis the Pelvis be so hung?

His hair greased back—

Into a stylish sleek Ducktail

Dripping with Vaseline…

_____________

The FFA boys would’ve—

Undoubtedly called him

Mr. Animal Husbandry Esq.

His genital genealogy—

Must have been engendered

By Roy Rogers’ Trigger!!!

How far back in time—

Did his skanky Family Tree

Stretch so Exquisitely?

_____________

Ronnie had my number—

He knew I was just a nelly

Closet-case Size Queen

It was time for me—

To get down to business

He had lots of Bad Seed

I was simply stunned—

It was a huge ten inches

Soft and only semi-hard

_______________

There was just enough—

Time for a desperate quickie

My ears perfect handle-bars

After that I was addicted—

To Ronnie’s insolent dick

There was no turning back

I followed him home daily—

To get my queer lips on it

I just couldn’t get enough!!!

_____________

From then on my world—

Turned upside down and

Totally like inside-out!!!

Fuck Junior High School—

And being a good student

It was BAD SEED time now

I became Nancy Kelly—

Much to Patty McCormack’s

Horror who had baggage

_______

Mommy Dearest had a—

Killer in the Closet who kept

The Bad Seed Curse going

I saw “Bad Seed” there—

In the Strand Theater and

Had this flash of déjà vu!!!

Evil tablespoons at first—

Then precocious pints came

Followed by gallons of jizz

______

Pardon me, my dears—

For being so awfully graphic

But I simply can’t help myself

Ronnie’s yearbook byline—

Was simple & short & seminal

“All I want outta school in me!!!”

I couldn’t agree more with it—

All I wanted outta school was

Ronnie and everybody knew why

_________________

He needed it really bad—

Flopped in the bathroom sink

Ronnie making love to himself

I had to be quick about it—

Getting him before he got himself

Off with a bad boy quickie

Even when he had snotty nose—

That was fair game too since

I loved it hot, thick & runny…

__________

I used to be embarrassed—

I used to blush myself scarlet

And everybody knew why

Bad Seed gave me the worst—

Wetdreams every night about

Ronnie up until graduation

After then he joined the Navy—

To get away from my unrelenting

Greedy obsession with his maleness

______________

I suppose I could write a book—

Called “Diary of a Size Queen” or

Maybe “Confessions of a Cocksucker”

But like Vivien Leigh as Scarlet—

In that classic “Gone With the Wind”

Those days are long gone, honey

My Nancy Kelly “Bad Seed” dayz—

Are long gone & never to return

All I have left is my sad memories…

The Granada Theater

MIDWESTERN REALISM

“But you have there the myth

of the essential white America.

All the other stuff, the love, the

democracy, the flourishing into

lust is a sort of by-play. The

essential American soul is hard,

isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has

never melted.”—D. H. Lawrence,

Studies in Classic American Literature

Sometimes it seems as tho—

It was written by somebody else

The reason for this Kansas noir—

This primal gothic slant to it

It’s always in a state of flux—

It demands a new Voice each time

Beowulfian monsters got stale—

The British word-hoard got moldy

American writers had to adapt—

Come up with a totally new noir

And when it happened stylistically—

One result was Midwestern Realism

Now Kansas Gothic Imagination—

Is going through changes again

The Tallgrass Prairie pukes up—

Somebody transgressive like me

The Granada Theater

copyright Kenton Rhoades

The Sirens of Atlantis

“Symmetric gilded statues”

—Severo Sarduy

The wet terraces dominated—

By ancient temples, the underwater

Plains between two vast seas

Overlapping the blue pyramids—

Symmetric glided statues standing

Like marble fragments in the snow

Apollo torsos with broad hands—

Devoured by moss-stained memories

Of what was or could have been

Drawing short mazes down deep—

Subterranean bodies dragged through

The river that buried them in the sand

A bed sharp stones, the frozen eyes—

The delta on one hand, and beyond a

Forehead, an arm, a chest

The Granada Theater

copyright Kenton Rhoades

The Midnight Transparent

“shadow wove the

other geometry”

—Severo Sarduy

The midnight transparent—

Filtering down from the Silver Screen

With the outline of glowing divas

In the matinee lethargy of afternoon—

When the remoteness of desert islands

In the changing sky twilight became

Opaque veils with red & orange sunsets—

As I slept in the balcony alone to myself

Watching Ali Baba and the Seven Thieves

Airborne copper lamps traced slow—

Spirals on the insides of my eyelids

Shadows weaving the other geometry