L.A. Weekly Poetry: 'Silver: 4 Connotations' by Jena Ardell

A.C. Thamer via LA Weekly Flickr Pool

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LA Weekly is now taking poetry submissions. Interested in having your work posted right here on our arts blog? Send previously unpublished poems along with an image to go with it to poetry@laweekly.com. Check out today's poem after the jump.

Silver: 4 Connotations
By Jena Ardell

Silver in San Fernando Valley
(fast, shiny and new)

Two beams
silver headlights
slice through the night sky,
                           like bullets,
 down Mulholland Drive

Lights divide
cutting quadrants
across bedroom walls
before disappearing
into the darkness
   quickly
        fleeting,
              now
         careening,
      down
           Topanga
            Cyn.
        Blvd.
where partygoers stay awake
 'til the stars are swallowed
by the San Fernando Valley fog

that pesters L.A. drivers
 Freeway road rage
   as sunglasses
        slide
               across
polished dashboards

 tall
         wide

SUVs & Hummers
each, only holding
                               one person

This morning
make-up smears
above
       &
          below
glassy pupils,
    metallic shadow to the brow
(what
        was I thinking?)

I walk to the mailbox
in pajamas,
     bed head reflection
            in shiny numbers

No one will see
me
                because no one
         does the speed limit

It finally came today
           The steak knife
that cuts through a shoe sole
    (or at least that's what
 the infomercials say)

I don't care if it can't
      I just wanted something new




Silver
(old and used)

Wooden coffee table
slick with dew
A rare roadside treasure
free to those who can haul it away

Two giant
wet glasses stains
in the center
accented by
silver spills
of God-knows-what

The voice inside my head
says,
   "Take me,
     make me new."


Silver on the 101 (cloudy, unclear)

Slinking down the 101
         Abrupt stops.
Cherry taillights
    explode color
         into monotone sky

squinting to see
         through silver fog
an infinite amount of steam
         sl ug gish ly   sails
into my car
         through  open  windows

constant streams
         of streetlights
slur into the air
         as we
(this fog,  these strangers, myself)

         sit in the San Fernando Valley
sedated.
         wondering what minuscule detail
will distinguish this day
                                     from the last




Silver (stale, slow)

Stale
silver
smoke rings
moseying carbon monoxide

stiff
disguised cylinder
nicotine
&
tar
traces of ammonium
& cyanide

smoke me.