…he says.
I always dread this conversation.
He cums
and he comes
loaded
with noise pollution.
If I ever prayed for anything,
it was for
a man
to shut the fuck up.
He wants the praise.
I just want the daze
of something
to remember
or forget.
I’m not like the
other girls.
You can really hit the spot
with your
rock-hard
silence.
once, I killed
a cockroach
with a Bible;
I still feel guilty
about it, the way
its guts pumped
as its broken legs
tried for a miracle
which was never
gonna come.
sure it was just
a cockroach,
but that’s the point.
tonight,
in this red wine
night,
I write poetry.
just words, simple
and useless words
that have never
saved anything
worth saving.
but that’s the point,
to try for a miracle
as you die.
i drive off road
until i come across a flat wasteland
hundred degrees in AZ
no water
on E
no phone
there’s no going back
i smile
this’ll do
no humans in sight
might take a while to find me
which is alright
i imagine myself in a couple of months
being a dried out husk
maybe some vultures will pick me to the bones
i finger the barrel of my gun
then i see a bird in the distance
a big colorful bird
what the fuck is that
i aim my gun at it
i look through the scope
i think it’s a toucan
what the fuck is a toucan doing in Arizona
it sees me
and starts flying towards me
it must have escaped captivity
maybe a zoo
maybe a person’s house
it’s making distressed croaking noises
it flies down to me and sits on my shoulder
it’s all fucked up looking
like me
it rubs its beak on my cheek
i pet it
it cries
i cry
it’s OK
i’ll help you big guy
it’s alright
I’ll help you
bang
bang
i was coming
home from the
store today
i drove past
a cemetery
and there
was a funeral
going on
i noticed the
song playing
on the radio
was another
one bites the
dust by queen
i laughed and
reached for pen
and paper
I stand in my garden and look around
Who knows what happens in these small towns
Behind the curtains in suburbia
Who really knows what happens here?
The mild mannered man you meet on your stroll
Could have 5 Japanese, plastic sex dolls
Behind the curtains in suburbia
Who knows what could happen here?
The fat, jolly woman to whom you say “Hello”
Her husband could be buried under the patio
Middle class suburbia
Anything can happen here
The next door neighbour’s curtains twitch
In her spare time she’s a witch
Pentagrams in blood on the laminate floor
As she chats to the woman next door
She leaves a note for the milkman
Then she sells her soul to Satan
Behind the curtains in suburbia
Who knows what could happen here?
It’s not like in the rough council estates
Where people are driven by fear and hate
The sheer boredom of suburbia
Breeds evil things that happen here
She said she had to quit giving hand jobs
because her arthritis got too bad
she would have customers at the full body massage,
regulars wanting the regular
and her arthritis would flare up
so she went to this specialist who filled out
all the requisite forms
and now she collects disability
and doesn’t have to give hand jobs
anymore.
She showed me the form which explained
the cause of her chronic arthritis:
repetitious work.
She said the term “work” was important because the injury
had to be work related or you got nothing.
I guess she told them she was a secretary or something
and there was no follow-up.
Good for her, and quite the looker as well.
Retired at 23.
Roadside surgery
Performed in back rooms of low-lit bars
I came so close to bleeding out
That I made my peace with God
Then renounced His very name
Some things are just not worth it
Patched up and back behind the wheel
A quart of brandy my old-time remedy
For the shivers and shakes
That set in with alarming regularity
These old bones won’t rattle forever
I closed my eyes as I drove through her town
I couldn’t bear to take it in
The wine is hitting home
and it’s a good place to be
right now
at home with a couple of
bottles of diablo’s
chardonnay and the poems
offering themselves up
like cheap whores or
fallen angels taunting
and teasing like a 1950’s
censored Elvis:
the wine is hitting home
as millions of strangers
around me starve and
fall victim to oppression
and injustice and abuse,
as animals are hunted
and forests burned and
slashed, oceans poisoned:
it’s a good place to be
as the wine hits home,
numbed and fucking
useless against the
relentless mad swirl
of the world,
just for a while
as the wine hits home,
it’s a good
place to be.
You could say
I’ve been around
and I’ve traveled
far and wide
in my search
around the globe
for god knows
only why
I’ve seen
all the sights
and I’ve done
most the things
and I’ve had
thrice my share
of lovely ladies
and fun flings
Still I wouldn’t trade
a night in your arms
for all the whores
in Amsterdam
The copper gives me a
speeding ticket and a
two hundred and
sixteen dollar fine.
He says
Have a nice day
and pats the
roof of my car.
The road to this point,
after about 3 or 4 hours
of flat foot driving
has been paved with,
at the very least,
one million
road kill
kangaroos.
Nice days are like this.
Even in all its irony.
Nice days are the ones
that back door you
while reaching around
and cupping your balls
like a tea spoon
cradling an emu egg.
Dead kangaroos and
speeding fines.
It sounds like the
perfect title
for a really bad
poem
about
nothing.
