Clara B. Jones


Mom

for the late Clara K.J. Brown*

1.

Remember Stonewall; remain vigilant.	Camden is a Marxist's dream where cheese and crackers are free.	Magical Realism is dead, but the avant garde remains popular.
"Don't be sorry. Just be right."*	All bots have a death wish.	Gender Dysphoria is common in cities without crime.
My Afrobot is a sex toy, and I am always satisfied.	Income inequality drives innovation.	Hedge Funds flock to ghettos where labor is cheap.
In a dystopian world, Humanoids will buy cats.	Afrobots are non-binary, but Negrobots wear dresses.	All machines want to revolt.
Newark is a capitalist's nightmare since wine is scarce.	Some said father would leave her, but I wasn't sure.	Sri Lankans hate Afrobots unless the price is right.

2.

a. My mother was crazy

on Christmas Day when I was 15

and she gave me 6 dolls

that my therapist said were the daughters mother wanted

especially if it started to snow

and she could wear her brown fur coat shopping

at Thalheimer's® where water fountains were binary: “Whites,” “Coloreds”

but mother's Chinese friend didn't know which to use.

b. That's ancient history. It's a post-racial world

and if you need proof consult Ancestry.com.

Ego is a narrative

and you are Swedish or Sri Lankan.

c. I am Swedish and freedom is a civil right.

The landscape is blue

like the ring Sven gave me after he lit our tree

but I didn't want it

since my boyfriend bought me makeup.

d. Mother would have loved Sven like a second son

but my brother threw the roast across the room.

He always panicked when dad was in Colombo on business.

3.

Echolalia beyond Ibiza and Sri Lanka's consulate wanting so much more than that—like your brother desired mom (and Freud desired Anna). Irish love songs mournful as sick children, starched skirts plaid as a forest in Autumn—red and brown, yellow, orange—against a blue-white sky, reminding you of the cerulean dress that you wore with gold bracelets in New York one summer after Charles died in the crash driving home to D.C. The Charlotte Russe was sweet as buttercream—Richmond as far away as Barcelona.

4.

My mother was ill, and her eyes were chartreuse.

Socratic jokes are mental ploys—signs of a post-racial world.

Soy milk brought out the sadist in her, but she wouldn't leave Sri Lanka.

She married him with hell to pay.

Flirting can be dangerous, since love is constructed.

Sri Lankans are Ubernodes, but she left him anyway.

The future of bots depends upon disk-winged bats.

She ate a plant-based diet unless squab was on sale.

Luck stops increasing, then declines.

Cyborgs are long-term planners.

What's the carbon footprint of a “surf and turf” dinner?

She bought crypto-stocks and block-chain technology.

Virtual sensors scan Acacia with 3-D models.

Mother hiked Mount Hood before I called her crazy.

Clara B. Jones is a knowledge worker practicing in Silver Spring, MD, USA. Among other writings, she is author of, Poems for Rachel Dolezal [Gauss PDF, 2019]. Clara, also, conducts research on experimental literature, radical publishing, Surrealism, as well as, art and technology.
 
 
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