The Subversive Beauty

of All We Deem Weird

“I prefer the absurdity of writing poems

 to the absurdity of not-writing poems.”

                              ~Wistawa Szymborska

I like things that are weird.
Weirdness always throws me
 back on myself, forcing me
 to take ownership
of my perceptions.

I like a weird movie. I can’t lie.

Give me a dream sequence

any day.

Bring on the blurry transition shot

slowly revealing the protagonist’s past;
both borrowed and oddly my own.

The curtain of painted eyes

being cut with giant scissors 

in “Spellbound”.

The piano with a thousand keys.

That clock with the wilting hands.

Weird always gets my attention. 

It draws me in.

A fetish is weird.

A hundred pairs of shoes

all neat in their boxes, and the owner

on a pair of bedazzled crutches.

The stepsister who sliced

off her heel in hopes of marrying the prince.

A sexually stimulating stink.
A sweater knit for a tree.

Voodoo dancers entertaining
at a children's party.

That dress made of meat.

I love nothing more than

a crooked door.

Any optical illusion

that morphs into something obscene.

The unsettling sensation
of being in the vice grip
a dog passionately
dry humping your leg.
What could feel more weird
than that?
I like not knowing
what something is.
What is that?

I like things that shock.

I like the surreal.

An apartment so absurdly cluttered

there’s nowhere to sit or walk,
or sleep. There's no bed!

I like art where I least expect it.

A hideous painting

cherished without an ounce of irony. 

I like an animal in a baby carriage

dressed up like Shirley Temple.
Fake flowers at a funeral.

If it’s weird, it’s worthwhile.

But not weird for weirdness sake.

I like weird when its not put on;

sincere, passionate, utterly misguided

weirdness that tips

the mind towards delinquency,

unexpectedly revealing

the hitherto unforeseen truth

that even angels
need to use the bathroom.

I like what’s not allowed or acceptable

as long as it does no harm.

A sudden wet drip or spatter 

onto your face out of nowhere
(and it isn't raining!).

A person perusing a porno 

on a tiny t.v.
in the middle of the woods.

A hot pink living room.

That unbelievably giant stool

clogging the toilet
in the latraine at summer camp.

The way I used to pretend to fall

down the stairs when my parents

threw cocktail parties,
 or that old chestnut:
playing dead by the side of the road

Weirdness is akin to beauty
as it is always
in the eyes
of the one who
it beholds.

Peter Valentyne

September 8th, 2019