His striking figure notwithstanding, when the moon is full
late-night shoppers hasten on home. Architectural features cling
to his thoughts. He sleeps with snails.
“We could do with more hairballs.”
Slathered in foreboding.
Lucky Pierre was here, was not . . .
Grisly protrusions, ochre secretions—
in a Potemkin village they exist elliptically,
leaving sticky hints.
Lycanthropes, out of malice (some say modesty),
favor opaque over pel
lucid.
Thankless task: sorting teardrops where
werewolves regret with every
drawn breath.
Soft-slippered, eyes half-closed,
whoosh whoosh whoosh,
slam! he goes.
Easy come, easy go.
Lucky Pierre,
he knows where to look.
Lucky Pierre’s allure resides in his mind. We add
a few choice gobbets, taking care to keep them tangible (edible,
digestible, friable, risible, flammable, fungible . . .).
Loco Schlomo, Lucky Pierre’s board-certified sensei,
recalls successes embroidered with threads
of purest silver and glaucous guts.
When Lucky Pierre’s teeth require filing,
dental assistants cower
in closets.
The distant hills resemble a naval blockade, or, in the right light,
upholstery. Werewolves look like
werewolves.
In the interest of public safety, Lucky Pierre’s saliva includes
an antiseptic. He’s also a shape shifter. Have
another look at your couch.
A werewolf’s glance screams en garde! Even as I craft
these lines ensconced in my cozy inglenook,
I tremble and perspire.
When Lucky Pierre feels out of sorts, he naps.
Prying him from the pavement proves
a thankless chore.
When the mood strikes, Lucky Pierre boils pumpkins
in commensurately large pots over very large fires. No one
knows why, nor has anyone the courage to ask.
On fine and starry nights Lucky Pierre mounts a bronze stallion
already bestraddled by a bronze war hero.
Here too, best not to ask.
Lucky Pierre’s endearments attract gnats and bats.
His indestructible shithouse sits at the center
of an impenetrable maze.
As for those who go about muttering, “Surely everything’s something,”
an example must be made! Lucky Pierre loathes
inanities!
How conspicuous is a werewolf? Say, as a manatee in a sand box,
a vampire in a distillery, an iceberg in a dining room,
a Goldberg bereft of variations.
Mike Silverton is most recently the author of New and Used Poems and Objects (2026), Yoga for Pickpockets (2024), Trios (2023), and Anvil on a Shoestring (2022).
His poetry appeared in the late '60s and early '70s in Harper’s, The Nation, Wormwood Review, Poetry Now, some/thing, Chelsea, Prairie Schooner, Elephant and other publications he may have (and most likely) mislaid. William Cole included Mike’s poems in four anthologies: Eight Lines and Under, Macmillan, 1967; Pith and Vinegar, Simon and Schuster, 1969; Poetry Brief, Macmillan, 1971; and Poems One Line & Longer, Grossman, 1973.
As a culture go-getter, Mike produced poetry readings for The New School for Social Research, New York’s municipal radio station, WNYC, and Pacifica Radio’s WBAI, KPFA, and KPFK. One glaring regret: Mike had arranged to record Frank O’Hara on the week in which he was killed, the weekend intervening, by a dune buggy.
Mike’s music writing, centering on modernist classical, appeared in Fanfare, a bimonthly review, and several Internet publications, including his own LaFolia.com. Mike's reviews of high-end audio hardware appeared in the main in The Absolute Sound, a print publication, and StereoTimes.com. For the unlikely audiophile reading this, Mike's speakers are Wilson Audio Sasha W/P.
When Mike and Lee relocated from Brooklyn to Midcoast Maine in early 2002 he indulged an interest in Dadaesque assemblage, resulting in several works in a group show at The Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockport, and a one-man show at Belfast’s Aarhus Gallery. Mike and Lee’s 1842 house and barn are peppered throughout with work he’d have preferred to sell. (Jefferson Davis spent a night, obviously at an earlier time. Really.)