poem by Wynne Renz with nocturnal photographs by Bernie Fanelli

The girl was Plain
Simple,

In her one-word answers regarding the accusations
Posed by the newscaster so pretty, must have been a contest queen
About who went where, lodged what bullet
The night they found the dog dead in the road, a hole through its tail
Outside the liquor store,
Where some unlucky (lucky if you ask whoever)
Took the wad of cash, a couple of celebratory Jack Dan’s
And filled the register with rocks.

Talking about prohibition here, people:
Very few choices are given to the masses,
And many given to the few.

On the fringe of lacking a couple hundred,
The backside of a busy restaurant
Turns the tarter
Once, for the passing of a waitress
Twice, for when she drops a five, and

A dollar for six men to a room
Shaving the wood chips off the broken leg of a bed
Already splintered by sour love making,
To ride out the gas tank of a beater
Save a few miles left on its life.

No means to be depressing, here. Not trying to bend your knees,
Just getting close to the earth to uncover some rocks
Along the grounds of metal fences, in towns laced with whiskers

As rocks,
Are the ugly third cousins to
Great American monuments
Bolted to the ground, flanked in surveillance
To protect the

Wars and Heroes who pen
Heart wrenching memoirs
Run for office on
What it means to struggle
For a life

That is no more plain
Than it is simple.

Wynne Benjamin Renz is a writer and namer living in Los Angeles.  For more of her work, visit her blog Only this time it’s real and just more beautiful.

Bernie Fanelli is a stone mason, photographer, guerilla rope swinger and traveling bartender at large in western North America.