Dontcha just hate trying to finish a poem?
It's always like there could be just a hint of this, a dash of that;
too much seasoning, not enough time spent simmering;
did you use the right amount of ingredients;
was it tablespoons or teaspoons?

Dontcha wish you could just pluck one out of the freezer:
One wrapped up in a neat little package?
Leaving it on the stove-top to thaw a little,
before heating it up at your timely convenience?

I wish I knew when these **** things were done;
Wish I could stick em in a microwave, clock in the allotted time for a work like that to be well-cooked and consumable--
Wait around zoning out to the droning tone of the toasting note,
then awake from my spell by the sweet dinging of completion.

I'd take that steamy sucker out of that commodious kiln
in such great haste I can barely hold it in my hands!
"Boy oh boy does this one look tasty!"

I'd sit down with my necessary utensils and have a go at it, chewing thoughtfully and enjoying this wonderful piece I have prepared by myself for myself--and without all the hassle and wasted time
spent slaving over books and pages and pens and inspirations!

But ****;
Nobody likes poems cooked out of pre-made packages;
they're a little too rubbery, a little too mushy, a little too bland--
and worse off they were made by the assemblyman's hand! (or claw).

Nobody likes their poems coming out of pre-made packages;
They ain't nothing like the real thing.

If you drive down route 235,
the lonely parallel line of route 5,
running through St. Mary's County, Maryland,

between the intersection of Old Three Notch road
and St. Andrew's Church road,
and the liquor store at the corner of Mattapany--
you must do so with a fat wallet,
and a growling stomach,

who barks at the flashing signs
of the sparkling chain restaurants--
wafting their familiar scents out the windows
and onto the busy street.

Utterly beleaguered every which way by these olfactory factories,
your mouth waters and your wallet lightens
as the tantalizing sensations
permeate your vehicle.

So you cave;
another lost soul vacates the street at Restaurant Alley,
under the prowling searchlights
and the intoxicating smells lingering like a dense fog;

You linger in your purgatory with glee.

You exit satisfied, patting your abdominous belly
and lifting your smiling face to the sky
in thanks to the gluttonous gods
who rain down these chain restaurants
from the heavens.

A satisfied sigh seeps out of loose lips,
barely hanging on to your fleshy face,
so ruddy and fat.

You act like your stop was something novel,
like it wasn't routine to acquiesce to these temptations;
you return to your car to continue your roamings
down restaurant alley.

Sadly, a full stomach won't stifle a querying nose,
and your senses are soon at it again;
just as the waiters and waitresses,
cooks and busboys--
are back at the window, leaning outside
with their clamorings and bustlings and cookings--

You pretend to entertain willpower as your copilot,
but even if that were so,
your senses would still be at the wheel,
with your mind bound and gagged in the trunk.

Restaurant Alley goes on for miles and miles and miles,
seemingly endless in the permeating fog of
burgers and pancakes and pasta and chicken and fries and burgers and soda and ice cream and beer and pasta and wine and America and pancakes and steak and appetizers and desserts and entrees and specials and kids menus and burgers and chicken and pasta and fries and burgers and ice cream and salad and burgers and soda and eat and eat and eat and eat and eat!

There's nothing to eat;
there's nothing to do but eat in Restaurant Alley,
on route 235 in St. Mary's County, Maryland.

So fasten your seat belt,
and loosen your waist belt,
and take a doomed trip down the endless roadway--

where you are dragged, shackled to food chains
that haul you from the perdition that is the lobby's waiting room
to be seated with loved ones at the mercy seat of Ambrosia.

I'm the forlorn cigarette
you once placed so fervently
between soft lips;

Now I lay cast between
the cracks of the sidewalks sidewalks sidewalks.

Anticipating a

Slow Death; growing claustrophobic--
ensconced in my callous/caustic confines.

Trampled into the concrete crevice by
hastened footsteps;

My desolation denotes the sad dictum
that is my denigration.  

A slow digestion of a stubborn body
created like the concrete to be trodden by wandering soles
stamping out their fleeting existence.

Dissolute, wishing to burn;  
I long for your taste again.

crossing from
the park
to the bank,
stepping over
the remains
of a grackle
on the grass
that glides
into the sidewalk
and

suddenly

dissolves
at the verge
of the

road

For Aleš, who reads pacifist novels during wartime

I

For the Millennials:
Victims of opportunity,
Saviors of humanity.

Muse-less, useless, a twentynothing!

We, the Confounded Chiliads,
are the electrified pulsating
offspring of the digital age:
Serendipitous,
enigmatic
vagabonds of the modern world.

Standing juxtaposed between
two centuries,
two generations:
Redeemers of the new millennium.

We’ve read the writings on the wall,
for they have been by our own hand.
Blood dripping down the fluorescent page,
the endless scroll that consumes our gaze.

Gaping holes in our hands and feet,
screaming telephone poles pin us to the magnetic current.

We are trapped but we are not alone.

With every word we bleed,
with every eye to our flesh,
our cries are drowned in the digital void.

We have been washed away by alluded idiosyncrasies,
never unanimous nor harmonious;
feeling our fingers tie into knots,
mangled, finagled, wringing, hovering like a
Ouija board over menacing letters.

We close our eyes and feel them
burning within our skull.

So many voices, so many bodies,
pouring into our thoughts;
endless rainfall
drowning the long coveted silence.

So desperate for the parting
of ***** storm clouds,

for a sign from heaven
to pierce through the ceaseless night,

to cast its lovely gaze upon us
like a father’s warm and gentle hand,
lifting up downcast faces.

We toil in our anguish,
suffering information overload;
a whole race of individuals
accumulating into a massive “I told you so.”

Every wish, every genius mind,
every glance into the future,
every crystal ball rubbed,
Electric Eye awakened

as the dream sighs into existence;
the blending of fact and fiction
in the prophesies of Fathers Orwell and Huxley:
maddened forlorn oracles of modernity.

As we cross the rivers of Babylon
to find ourselves swimming in
the Fountain of Youth
we escape dripping, exhausted;
aching bodies shivering.
They drape expensive towels around us,
breathing warmly on our exasperated shells
of humanity.

Our mortal vessels no longer capable of
carrying our fragile identities,
we leap out of their torpid mouths
exposing the gelatinous crustacean.

Amorphous brain matter
sponge-like, soaking up
the sweat of our plunder and plight—
Clinging desperately as our liberators

pry us off the wet earth
like barnacles off a ship’s keel,
wringing us out
over the supper bowl:
the thin soup of mortal consciousness.

Feeling our voices and vices,
virtues and virulence,
mingling together;
meshing into one.

The hive mind descends upon us,
protruding a gaping straw
from its abdominous being;
sticking it into the electric ocean,
proceeds to **** life up into its
wrinkly, sickly tightened mouth.

Past the gleeful tongue,
down the throat;
tumbling over each other aimlessly
in the darkness—
limitless potentialities.

Directionless;
ambiguous
voices in the dark:
cavernous, mindless cacophony.

Echoes bouncing off
the windows of my soul,
I tumbled into the darkness
lost, and afraid.

“The world is yours!”

I never feel my feet stop moving.

Our nightmarish episode of consumption concludes,
leaving us moaning, naked, confused in the depths:
Haunting spirits wandering these novel dwellings
built on the backs of the olden brutes
and the barbarous archetypic minds of the Marxist prophets.

In this world of post-civilization,
we are post-human(e) in our efforts;
unable to gain a foothold in the foundation—
more quicksand than earth and stone.

Our seeds were thrown to the weeds and the crows.

II

Muse-less, useless, a twentynothing!

I glance at the others: gangly gangrenous guiles!
Feasting on each other, never growing any stronger;
clawing out each other’s eyes, spitting in their mouths,
screaming utterances most foul in their ears.
Climbing over each other in the obscurity, unseen.  

I want them to take my eyes.
I want them to take my ears.
I want them to take my voice.
I want them to squelch the flame
that burns within my cadaverous chest.

Surrendering any chance of agency;
if there were hands to bite,
I couldn’t see.
I hear the voices shouting,
but I can’t cut through the discord.

What if I hold my breath?
But I know that won’t last.
Feeling my lips turn purple,
the kick drum in my chest:

furious relentless crescendo
pace quickening mind’s racing
all the sins in the world
rotting in my soul inescapable
pounding at the door
clock ticking through the floor
lungs shrivel can’t take anymore—

Exhale.

Panting, hands on my knees,
ears perk up to the sound of malicious snickering.
I lift my gaze up to an eclipse of the moon,
so ghastly in fresh blemishes plaguing its majesty.

Squinting,
I see smiling faces,
eyes full of mocking laughter,
belonging to snide children
anxiously peering into the crowded fishbowl.

They watch us squirm without water,
dancing in aching bodies,
craving the touch of something cool,
and refreshing.

They dangle hope and promise like
lifeless puppets encircling
an infant’s crib.

I watch them tie onto simple strings:
wealth, and
power, and
love, and
belonging.

Reaching higher, and higher,
straining formless muscles,
feeling weakness overcome
creeping up like a tired conscience
climbing over the golden crest
atop the transparent foothills
encased in the nicotine screen skyline.

It hangs its head low
on its hands and knees,
lifting up a weary voice
so familiar and ignored.

A final sigh ringing in the ears of a generation:
A cough, and then a final weak sputter:
“I Told You So.”

III

Muse-less, useless, a twentynothing!

Anchored to the next big thing
sitting below deceptive still waters
murky mysterious
loathesome beast
peeking an eye out to catch us peering
over the edge of the docks
a glimpse at the promised eternity
immortality
delusion of grandeur
our eyes to the shore
nostalgia preserved
in the retellings of folklore
childhoods never forgotten
for fear of being lost in the present
and the forthcoming future
always a step away
how can we move on
when we’re busy cutting off our legs
to be eye level with our inner child
more like an exoskeleton
more exposed than our need
to grow
we sit huddled in our bemired despair
grinning sheepishly exposing our sin
crying out to the gargantuan
overlord of childlike fantasy
wielding our innocence
like a button-eyed ragdoll gluttonous treasure keeper
playing with fire in the alchemist’s den
so close to our material wealth
with the flames roaring lapping at our heels
feeling the dock begin to break from dry land
from the weight of our inflated consciences/consciousness
following the fangs of the snake to our parents
on the shore
with one hand sweating on the television remote
strangling in its grasp
they have no choice
but to squeeze the pump
harder and faster
legs of flesh and bone
break and give way
we begin to drift from the shore
pulling closer to the murky behemoth
that lurks under the perpetual offing
in the empty horizon we cry our broken hearts
into its cosmic bowels
feeling ourselves being sifted through
the hungry machinery of death
eyes luminous we shield our faces
from its rapturous gaze
fearful of the pillar of salt
that will stand in our place
but we look back
we take our hand off the plow
with ***** and Gomorrah at our backs
we peer through the electric eye
the sands of time
pouring through the hourglass
that spits us into the depths
of eternal strife.

IV

Muse-less, useless, a twentynothing!
Twentynothing!
Twentynothing!
Twentynothing!

Tw­entynothing in the classrooms!
Twentynothing in the workforce!
Twentynothing in the bathrooms!
Twentynothing in our parents' wars!

Twentynothing in the golden streets!
Twentynothing in the broken homes!
Twentynothing in the dusty libraries!
Twentynothing in the TV's drone!

Twentynothing in the Promised Land!
Twentynothing in the songs we sing!
Twentynothing in the secret plans!
Twentynothing in freedom ring!

Twentynothing in hands over hearts!
Twentynothing in our love in bed!
Twentynothing in the obscure route’s start!
Twentynothing in the lies we've read!

Twentynothing in the lives we fear!
Twentynothing in the scholar’s debt!
Twentynothing in our guns held dear!
Twentynothing in the tables set!

Twentynothing in the colors of skin!
Twentynothing in the reality show!
Twentynothing in the losses and win!
Twentynothing in the nightmares below!

Twentynothing in the kisses we hide!
Twentynothing in the I O U’s!
Twentynothing in the chanting of pride!
Twentynothing in the love you too’s!

Twentynothing in the hope we give!
Twentynothing in the dread they moan!
Twentynothing in the time we live!
Twentynothing in the chance we own!

Muse-less, useless, Twentynothing!

In the post-modern world aimless!

We, the Confounded Chiliads:
We are dangerous,
We are longing,
We are hopeful,
We are broken,
We are serendipitous—
We are eternal.

We Are Twentynothing.

…and that’s **** well something.

Consume me
Consume my whole soul
Consume me
Consume my whole mind
Consume me

Use me
Use me in a good way
Use me
Use me to make you happy

Love me
Love me passionately
Love me
Love me as long as you can

Destroy me
Destroy my walls
Destroy me
Destroy my whole world
And let me live in yours

The mannequin faceless,
Clothed in gold
With hands pandering svelte,
Remains an admired inanimate,
Albeit, atop whispers to a girl,
A 4-foot flower 3-feet my right,
Fretting and stumped;
Extrinsic a label – “undesirable.”

The mannequin faceless,
Her and hollow –
A towering nose above, stands
Opaque ivory, scarred come
Synonymous eyes with a symmetrical
Soul, assumed plastic perfection
And more importantly,
Soon to be sale.

The mannequin faceless
Convinced her new friend,
Her lesser, lopsided,
And natural not-so counterpart
To consume,
“Eat me, “eat me,” “eat it all,”
And then, “binge some more.”

The mannequin faceless
SCREAMS,
“BUY!”  Amongst the other torments –
Born both fingers that can’t move and
The thumbs that shuffle, “One’s,”
To the girl that was never,
“Good enough;” so shared the
Tabloid’s mouth.

The mannequin faceless demands
And DEMANDS nothing less than to
Buy, starve, suffer and sacrifice
So that every “broken body,”
May embody polymer, and for a price,
A not so fair trade whilst
Considering old man gold,
The curator of conundrum
And the plastic he’s created.

I won't be the girl who is terrified of shadows and silence.
I'm better than the mind that at times consumes me.