Two Poems
Jon Cone

The Dutch Masters

Apples, pears, lemon peel,
lemon, a large slab of cheese

marked by knife and teeth,
red and green grapes

spilling out of a basket,
with biscuits on a plate

and one mug of beer.
The sum of these items

in balanced disarray
on a rust-colored table.

A sacrifice to pleasure
and need in the blood.

Yet beneath it all
the same-old same-old

worm-ridden rictus
of the lapsed realm.

On Mercy Undeserved

Grace tastes of tangerines.

It is shade in summer heat.

And a drunk whose heart is a loon at dawn.

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