Thursday night
Sittin’ ’round a table
At Clete’s bar, we all
Try to come up with
Ways to get some
Extra money. Me?
I’m sellin’ a few things.
Paul’s workin’ overtime.
Poncho’s just lookin’
For the part-time job.
Jimmy laughs at us
And says gettin’ by
Ain’t all that hard.
“You want a Coke,
Suck a dick. You want
A pack of smokes,
Suck a dick.” None
Of us were ever that
Hard up that we even
Considered following
Jimmy’s advice. But
None of us had spent
Twenty years in prison.
it had been about a year
since I last called
and her Dad had died
so I facetimed her
to give my condolences
and as I watched her face
I felt her long soft flowing hair
the back of her neck
the joy-burst
of her lips
and continued to get
aroused
looking at her bare shoulder
above her cream-colored fuzzy
jumper
and suddenly
I proposed
that we be married to each other
about a week
once a year
and she said
Yes
now
contemplating our next rendezvous
I miss her body
remembering the glorious sight of her
riding me that warm summer in Boston
I miss her
like the sailor the late morning rise
I remember a locked door
Against which a ten-year-old girl
Pressed her entire frame
A little above keyhole height
The first time
She heard her parents do things
The first time she heard
The mother moan
And not in pain
The moaning ended
The image lingered
Today the girl sits
And watches a pregnant neighbour
Wondering what her ultrasound looks like
If it’s a ‘Rosemary’s Baby’
Growing inside
Another house to the left
Has this woman in her early thirties
A Belle De Jour
Husband slouched with briefcase
Unsuspecting
In his 9 to 5 routine
The voyeur hasn’t left me
The seeds, too deep inside
The ennui of our times
When every subway loaf
Across the globe
Is precisely
The same size
I will arrive
Unannounced
I will greet
With smile
And a muttered line
I will hold her face
Like a dead bird
I will kiss her lips
Dry
And I will strip her
Down
Make love
To her
The night
Will be naked,
Her head will tilt
Towards oblivion
As I run sandpaper between her
It will be so perfect,
Even I don’t
Believe me.
When your existential crisis has an existential crisis,
drink until your blood coagulates into a fine wine,
eat until your flesh turns into tasteless wafers,
take a dip in the River Styx, but not before
drowning one toe at a time to test the temperature,
then unplug the rubber stopper from the levee
below sea level after forty days of rain,
and flush us all counter-clock wise
back to the past tense.
I taught
high school English for one day,
more than enough to know the job
wasn’t for me; I must’ve told them
to pipe down a gazillion times;
come last bell I was in bad shape,
my throat raw, my voice reduced to
a painful rasp; no wonder we keep
hearing about teachers having sex
with their students; after six periods
of ear-splitting chaos it must be
highly cathartic to plug one up;
even the gabbiest, gossipmongering
cheerleader will find it hard, if not
downright impossible, to talk with
her mouth full.
I showed Dad the back page
of my comic book.
I wanted a squirting flower
(you’re soaked, sucka),
live Sea Monkeys
(make ‘em sufferrr),
but most of all,
a pair of $3
(only)
X-Ray Specs!
See right through clothing, brosky.
Scientific optical principal totally works.
Dad copped the load but the only
thing I really needed was the specs.
For starters, there was like Deborah
Black, Heather Horsey and,
(oh, Jesus),
Natalie “the rack” Cockburn.
Would have to be careful
around Ms. White in class.
Kept asking Dad, and fucking
praying to God.
The specs did not come. Fuck
God & fuck the Sea Monkeys
into the fucking ground.
Dad, where are they?
Soon. Promise.
Dad, where are they?
No fucking idea!
One morn when I was choking
the chicken in the shower,
the specs finally came.
Few weeks before,
I found me a switchblade and I
did murda the box with that lil’ mutha.
Can’t say if I wore them all day.
Can’t say that night I prob saw like
Dad’s dick by glow of my Batman nite-lite.
The cage door closes
and he is someone’s daughter,
someone’s Brittany,
passed around like butter,
bottom bunk bumping
and lipstick for the pig,
commissary property and certain
protections on the yard;
the guards running drugs and numbers,
more favours in Favourland…
our little Brittany sent to the infirmary
to be sewn up brand new;
no one likes a loosey goosey
when all you have is Time.
seven German beers and 10mg in
I suddenly remember
that my Mom called me a Son of a Bitch
once
another beer and she messages me
how r u?
we just arrived
in Vegas
I suddenly remember
and call her
to wish her
Happy Birthday
commences and only
the poem flies through
the fingers. stories, novels,
plays, they remain stranded
on an island engirdled by sharks the
size of tankers. it’s alright, I
drink, recapturing the essence
of my soul which I
almost lost over a love not
worth a nickel. only the poem
comes easy to the fingers.
nothing else,
stories, novels, plays,
they remain far away,
stranded in an island
I cannot reach
‘cause it’s too far from the shore
to swim to.
it’s alright,
I drink
slowly recapturing the essence of my soul
I almost lost
for a love that wasn’t worth a nickel. another
fifth drained, one more
bottom reached; it didn’t
contain the coveted answers, the
search continues. new fifth
cracked, a mix of junk and blow
shot into
the vein. not even powerful
speedballs can
kill me. no one else
around, all alone on a Saturday
night, it feels supernal. exhausted of
meaningless company, unwilling to
indulge in conversations that lead
nowhere. another gulp, another
shot, still alive. I lock door and windows, embracing
the imposing darkness. I see
my grave overlooking
a ravaged shore, a turtle comes to take
a piss on it. substances rush through my blood, destroying
a heart that died years ago. I broke
someone’s heart two days
ago; it’s alright, as long
as I drink. my wrongdoings turn into
blurry, insignificant
images. I disappointed yet
another person, a speedball injected
in the neck kills the guilt, turns remorse
into an alien emotion for lesser creatures. my muse
abandoned me, all the
inspiration I’ve left comes from
the sharp, dirty needle.
Horror Sleaze Trash 