ménage à trois I’m in a long-term relationship with Insomnia now, lucky me - quite intimate. Sometimes he greets me at bedtime, bringing his friend, the accordion player, ready for us to dance a polka. Other times he waits, creeps in at 3 a.m., quieter, juggling worry-balls, tossing a few my way. We’ve been monogamous, apparently committed, though there’s been no discussion; I hesitate to tell him, but suppose I must: I’ve been flirting with the Nap-Man, meeting up most afternoons, and I find he’s quite irresistible.
Ken Wheatcroft-Pardue
What I Did on My Summer Vacation, 1979 12 states, 2,000 miles. First, I took a driveaway service car, that broke down near Terre Haute, tattooing a red puddle of transmission fluid on I-70. Spent that night in a gas station parking lot, curled up freezing in the back seat. Then I hitched to Ohio, passed the Indianapolis 500, the Goodyear blimp lapping above the red bricks. A few days later, stuck in a semi inching through the Windy City. White CB users spewing racist epithets. Trucker with a sheepish grin, shrugs his broad shoulders, “Sounds like Chicago.” That night I spent in the Miller Brewery in Milwaukee, free beer in the breakroom. 12 states, 2,000 miles. A few days later I was driving all night with three Austrian college students from Minneapolis, who for some odd reason were just crazy about popcorn. Then crossed Missouri with four good ol' boy electricians from Alabama, Jim Beam drunk as skunks, belting out “Tuesday's Gone.” Just lucky I didn't end up dead or deaf. 12 states, 2,000 miles.Then when no one would pick me up in Alamogordo, caught a Greyhound through New Mexico. Then from Albuquerque, I took a 12-seat Cessna that barely scraped over the Sandias.The woman next to me, her fingernails digging into my arm, blurted, as lightning flashed and the plane rocked back and forth, “Sure as shit, we're all gonna die.”
Daniel S. Irwin
Failure I walk in During a hold up At the gas station. The robber Sticks his pistol In my face. So, I says, “Go ahead and shoot, Motherfucker.” He hesitates. He figures I’m just Another crazy guy. “Fool, I said shoot!” He pockets his gun And runs out. Failed robbery. Kids won’t eat today. I’m called brave By some and stupid By others. Actually, it’s neither. I’ve been so depressed That I’m ready to End it all. I’m just too pussy To do it myself. Count Me In I’m pretty stiff in the mornings. Sleepin’ on the ground ain’t As comfortable as it used to be. Maybe it never was. Bones ache. Still, I like that crisp morning air And that first cup of killer coffee. I miss my old horse but this here Youngster will do with some trainin’. Getting’ too old for this but I always Wanted just to be a cowboy. Never Made my fortune but earned enough To get by, to get my gear, to party some. Most of my compadres are planted Six foot under now. Guess there’s Still room for me when the time comes. Could have found me a woman to keep But this life makes that hard ‘cause There’s always one more round up And you can always count me in.
Ken Kakareka
Narrative I have a pain in my mid-section – possibly my liver. Cirrhosis got Kerouac and the 12-gauge got Hemingway before Cirrhosis could. The ways out for writers are bleak in most cases. I should probably put down the bottle the same way we need to put down this narrative about writers killing themselves, voluntarily. It’s a tired, old narrative and the people looking in from the outside don’t understand that it hasn’t been written by writers themselves. It’s been perpetuated by pop-culture vultures who need something to feed off of. Fate can be a cruel bitch who always gets her way and writers succumb to her lure which keeps the narrative alive when it’s iconic writers we should’ve kept alive instead.
Michael Lee Johnson
I Age Arthritis and aging make it hard, I walk gingerly, with a cane, and walk slow, bent forward, fear threats, falls, fear denouement─ I turn pages, my family albums become a task. But I can still bake and shake, sugar cookies, sweet potato, lemon meringue pies. Alone, most of my time, but never on Sundays, friends and communion, United Church of Canada. I chug a few down, love my Blonde Canadian Pale Ale, Copenhagen long cut a pinch of snuff. I can still dance the Boogie-woogie, Lindy Hop in my living room, with my nursing care home partner. Aging has left me with youthful dimples, but few long-term promises.
Rob Plath
upon closer inspection once in a while one of my demons dies & upon examining it close up i notice its claws more resemble the hands of my angels & when i fold them they’re soft & warm & i place a daffodil in them like i should’ve long ago
Alan Catlin
The first time I See them together I think maybe I’m seeing double, identical twin brothers under- dressed for sub- zero weather, killing time waiting for the 5:13 A.M. bus, drinking a six of the cheapest beer sold at corner 24 hour across the street, trading hits on massive roll your own doobie, then taking one last piss in bank parking lot. I want to ask them if they’re reporting to jail but I know it’s much worse than that, they’re going to work.
J. Ryberg
Cigarette Burns in the Sheets There’s part of me that really likes a good cheap motel room with a small patch of peeling wallpaper, a few cracks in the ceiling and one or two cigarette burns in the sheets and pillow cases, here and there, maybe a couple of shady characters pimping and dealing from a room around back. As long as there’s a liquor store, near-by, cable TV and hot water, then I’m good. An Old Courtyard A clock ticking in a dead man’s room, a feather stirred by a cool, damp breath of wind through the open French doors that lead to an old courtyard with cracked tiles, over-grown with what, no doubt, must have once been perfectly cared- for flowers, shrubs, trees, hedges, and even an old water garden pond, where a few frogs, koi and an ancient turtle can, miraculously, still be found, lurking, as must a pride of peacocks, somewhere on the grounds.
Livio Farallo
terminal couple hair black as a wine cellar holds me motionless all day; as a doddering sun with melted ear and melted eye can still debride lips of a kiss and scrape like a dermatologist. i am swindled once more of your heroin though i keep the plunger down like the taproot of a fir tree. i am grounded like a moa though the feathers in this head are my spirit’s imprisoned fingers squeezing through burlap. somewhere in this bravery is the iron grip to weigh against eggshell. somewhere, the bravery to wipe the silent bottoms of your shoes. somewhere are the wild cancers that will burn us up in one night. after gallows in the end i won’t know how deep are the graves in the cemetery or why they grin at all – why winter gives birth to an ice age and picks its chipped teeth. there is a value in warm rain nourishing a river: sound lightly dripping; sound of an axe raised through misty breath; sound of an exhausted fox; sound of a snake pit; sound of that sad scandinavia. i say, in an english voice, that little stem on your beret is a twisted chimney not letting out the smoke: i say this as memory seeps through walls muttering all over the floor. i work at tying this sack of human reasoning tight as a moneybag fills a hole in the ground: as blood does a split lip. in the end, a retrovirus mutates, becomes violated by something smaller. water is everywhere - that knuckles sing like braille on drowning fists cannot be for lack of breath and, though a sperm cell always carries a red rose, in the end, an invasive shower washes it all away.
Brenton Booth
A Poem for the Old Man Without a Name I’d get home late every night and all the lights were off in his building except his I’d look at his window as I walked up the fire stairs to get to my apartment his building was next to mine I was always tired from work I’d watch him sitting on the edge of his bed with a whiskey glass in his hand watching television looking like he didn’t have a worry in the world like every single second meant something special every night I came home from work he’d be there with the light on in the exact same position it was as if he were waiting for me to restore some hope to things after another completely wasted day though for the past week the blinds have been closed and light turned off today the blinds were open all the furniture was gone and tools sat in the spot he used to sit he is gone no one thinks of him anymore no one cares I care he was my light: I miss that light.