Middle-school adulthood
Picking on people is cool.
Nothing important is going on
That has anything to do with school.
Glasses make people four-eyed
Not being thin means they’re fat.
Stutters and stammers are funny
And being snotty is where it’s at.

Ding **** bell, being rich is swell
Don’t  be wimpy, not a smidge
Tree-hugging liberals can go to hell.
Revel in your white privilege.
You want to vote for a Democrat?
Have you lost your silly head?
Just check all the GOP boxes
With Daddy’s choice instead.

Now you’re all grow up today
And have a lot of political power
Which grows and grows  stronger
Each hour by Republican hour.
So don’t weaken now, baby
Do what you know is right.
Stick to your supremacist guns.
Because you know white makes might.

So use your sarcasm as a tool
Secretly whisper against the weak.
And those weak-kneed pacifists,
Those flag burning, long haired creeps;
Ignore them all; give their nose a tweak.
Just like the women you dated and married
They need to follow your lead in life.
After all, they don’t count the same as you.
The important thing is they’re just a wife.

Ding **** bell, power is swell
You never suffer, not a smidge
Don’t worry if you can’t spell.
Revel in your white privilege.
Never vote for a Democrat,
Don’t be that kind of stupid head.
Just check every the GOP boxes
Faithfully keep your state red.

Veronica LaMonica
Played the harmonica
In our local high school band.
She collected japonica
She says it is a tonic
Attuned to a young lady’s hand.
She swears she is not picky
But avoids the ricky-ticky
And goes instead for the class.
She claims not to be picky
But avoids like a big hickey
Anything of plastic or brass.

Veronica LaMonica
Played the harmonica
In our local high school band.
She collected japonica
She says it is a tonic
Attuned to a young lady’s hand.

Veronica is the prettiest
Down to the nitty grittiest
Girl in the local school we both attend.
She’s not always wittiest
Rather hit and messiest,
But I’m glad at least she is my friend.
I’d like her to be more
That’s what this rhyme if for
To tell her she’s the best in the world.
She ’s the very highest floor,
The one have always adored,
She’s most artistically talented girl.

Veronica LaMonica
Played the harmonica
In our local high school band.
She collected japonica
She says it is a tonic
Attuned to a young lady’s hand.

I’ve been thinking about
How they’d find me if I’m the next
Set to sleep in a velvet-lined box.

Clear nail polish,
Wide eyes and porcelain skin,
But a tattoo hidden beneath my white
Ralph Lauren blouse,
Just below my right breast.
I got it when I was sixteen, searching
For reasons to breathe.

There’d be slits in my wrists
From a watch that was always too tight,
My hair would be knotted, frayed,
Out of place for the first time, in tatters
And freshly women patterns
Of thread, home
To a spider or two.

Maybe they’d look in my purse,
Hoping for some ID,
And they’d find the pack of condoms
Tucked in the zippered compartment,
Or the Lortab saved from my trip
To the oral surgeon’s—God knows
The pain didn’t go away.

My feet would be covered in dirt,
And there’d be scratches on my
Bare legs. They’d take pictures, shake
Their heads, tsk

What a waste,
But I’d say
Nothing at all. To me,
The alley behind the smoke shop
May as well be a velvet box.

If I had a word to express how sorry I am.
I don't mean apologies because to filth like me that's an area of apathy.
I am no man, to be so, I'd have to give my self-esteem;
so better yet, here, take me hands,
Because all they do is take and suffocate the ones who give me life through mistake after mistake.
I'd dig a grave so deep, not even the **** in the pit could see me.
Believe me I look at myself and say wow how ******.
I don't even deserve to walk the ground beneath that’s me.
You gave a roof and I tore every shingle,
while you looked at me with weeping eyes as if it were inconceivable.
You gave food to nourish me and I throw in trash where I should be.
You gave me money and I burned it to crisp,
And blew the ashes in your face and lashed you with a whip.
I am not human I am lower than that.
I'm more useless than anything, what is anyone going to do with that?!
I need saving from this damnation!
The same one that's destroying and crippling hundreds of nations.
Someone give me the key and I'll fight the dragon even if I lose I'd be used at least a fraction.
It’s about time to transition and make a life worth living,
instead of just walking flesh of useless breathing.
Take up from my bedside and walk a journey of a thousand miles!
I'll walk to no end over mountains conquering every obstacle!
And when I'm done I'll look back to at your face and tell you all about the amazing race!
But I'll still be just as useless as a broken vintage tape.
There's nothing in this world that will ever be good enough,
And I'll just have to accept the fact that I am nothing more than a thief who's all used up.

I've not known the feeling

Nor can I even concieve

The notion of being whole.

Selling my brand months at a time

Interested parties holding auctions

Unaware, or unwilling to acknowledge

The stock in future  endeavours

So now I exist in 2nd hand memories

In the back of the mind, or the attic

Covered in dust, overexposed

A monument to my regrets

My last memory of…you
I drove all the way through town, chain-smoking through half
my pack as I burned deep inside from stoking the ashed embers of a fire
I had attempted to smother before it burned us both out after it had licked

Its way up my whole body—

But I reveled in how it ate me from the
deepest
inside while I let the tobacco
consume the healthy volume of my lungs leaving me breathless which I prayed
would either make you notice the red in my cheeks
or make you worry about me
in contrast from the systematic silence that had deafened our
friendship and scarred
any possibility of our future, but
when I got there you told me to drop the habit so it didn’t linger in my hair.
You also pointed out where the butts had rubbed away my lipstick and with a look that made
me want to smack
you across the face, but
also crush your lips
with mine because it
deepened your gaze
and sharpened your jaw
instead I said I’d gladly put the rest on you. Your friends, the Miss Priss Brigade,
saw chipped nail polish and slightly dull skin and last summer’s leftovers and I knew

we’d never end up
unfiltered and imperfect in the barely industrialized studio flirtingly touching
and kissing and dreaming and enchanting ourselves with the what-ifs of a future
we saw through wine glasses worn

by teenagers who didn’t know love from illusion.