Ursula

Poetry

Joshua Age of Johnson

A new poem by David Rimanelli in response to a painting by Servane Mary

Ursula detail hero for for Joshua Age of Johnson

Servane Mary, Galaxie Gourmet, 2025. Courtesy Servane Mary and Max Yawney

  • 12 June 2026
  • Issue 17

Have fun masturbating
cheerfully he intoned
Crisscrossing the hills and
Damon the Mower Metaphysical Poets of garbage final clearance sale just the
End Dior those mohair sweaters tearing up the flower beds
and a busted Flesh-lite Pink Pulsing silicon very rabid shivers tattered moldy
what the fuck those beige little segmented things
not a metaphor
Corpse of the OED
Valley of Kings

Lost in music the remix
Feel so alive I quit my 9 to 5
The car’s broken you’re lost
In the Jungle of the Cities
between bedroom and kitchen door
This wasteland so rich in garbage rich in
Belial’s trench and Charvet ties
Maggots and puce pocket square
Etheric scent Loti des Fleurus where
Violetta Valéry and her bathroom dudes
Folly! Folly and delirium vain you
Poor thing
alone
let’s drink from the dirty Chalice where beauty flowers!
and that aperitif Overheating these wasted kisses

It’ll be very Nan Goldin’s slideshow at
Rafik’s OP Screening Room back in the
East Village way back in the walk-in closet of (barely) the ’80s Avenue J and 4th St.
At The Bar on the Eastern Frontier of
Western Civilization Second Avenue where
Cliff Derwentwater oh boy oh boy
Ineptitude sublime but a risky business
He spills a bottle of Cesium Mandate
Poppers down my pulsing oracular nostril
Oenone s’est lancée dans la profonde mer
You are your own evil councilor
Rather more of a vial of down my than I
Anyway compose your scarred membranes Kleenex Bounty Comet
I buy a shrunken superstar one drink
Factory wants more White Russians where’s Dictionary of Rhymes
How happy is the blameless vestal’s lot!

Texting with you
Joshua Age of Johnson
How shall I futilely tack on
Rasselas Prince of Abyssinia
He’s fucking hot I sucked his dick in the
Parking lot

_

David Rimanelli began writing about art in 1988. From 1993 to 1999, he was a regular contributor to The New Yorker and has been a contributing editor at Artforum since 1997. A recipient of a Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant, his writing has also appeared in numerous exhibition catalogues.