Billy

ask Shakespeare for beauty 
& he will lie,
worship the moon & pray for you
‘til you leave his kitchen table

he sold nothing but diamonds,
jewels of the masses
painted rose, tomato red,
sky green & fuchsia

king of the produce section,
he peers into ruby-studded shopping baskets,
hands you a plastic bag,
composes sonnets on the watermelon rinds

his heart sinks when he hits the iceberg
lettuce, veering off-course, 
too far north
for the compasses of wine bottles
to bring him back

sometimes I almost work up the courage
to tell him I like the inkstains on his smock
‘cause they make him look a little like a
Jackson Pollock first draft

but then I realize his mouth is the linebreak
of a rhyming couplet
& I go back to hiding in the plums

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