A Lazarus body litters the sidewalk
outside a well-lit, desolate lobby.

On the left is a mexican restaurant,
with a line reaching to the
entrance. They should stamp
the grey and scratched up
plexiglass with a light and
dark purple neon:
Welcome To America.
It would be reinforced
by every delicious crunch
one hears on the way out as
cheap crumbs garnish concrete.

On the right, there’s a bar
alive on a Friday night.
Friends share hearty laughs
and pats on the back.
The bitter and the perishing
pretend they want this
when they should be
somewhere or someone else.
And mingling singles look for
compliments and numbers,
or maybe just someone to
take back and **** the **** out of.

But in the midst sits
a throne for ghosts.
Ceiling fluorescent reflects
off porcelain, paler than a farmer tan.
There are no other colors besides
the receptionist, bored to death,
leaning on the wall behind
the porcelain reception desk,
reading a copy of Ebony.
No ottomans or chesterfields
or benches. No consoles or cocktail
tables. Nothing adorning the walls.
Not even a stain.
Just a white hole, a bright
***** in an otherwise colorful
street on gray canvas.

I rise from my slumber
and mosey on out the lobby
in my purple linen suit.
The impoverished scrag,
his dog lapping his sores, asks
if I’d spare some change.

“Sorry, I only have card tonight.”

“That’s alright, sir. God bless.”

And I walk on, aware of the
Abrahams rubbing up against
a ****** in my wallet. I take a sip
of whiskey hidden in my empty
can of a drink that can never
satiate me. I wait for traffic to pass,
and then I jaywalk across Sticks St.


-
by Aleksander Mielnikow

I'm Alive
But only still.
Can't thrive
Cold is shrill.
Fight & Fight
Work & Pain.
Suffering,
But All
In Vain.
Hours glide by
I'm still bored.
Crying on my
Bathroom Floor.
I'm Tired
Of this silly
Game.
You tell me
To Play,
But that won"t
Fix my
Shame.

Why can't I just wake up there?
Why must I wake up here?
Too young to stay,
Too broke to leave,
Feels like all I can do is bleed
My bitter disdain for this place.
It's here that I slept in my car
Hours after becoming homeless.
Here that I was dejected
By soughtless dreams.
Here that I suffered a miser's
Misfortune,
Having lost my family.

Then again,
I found love here.
In a place so vile
She somehow made me smile.

Maybe things aren't so bad,
Maybe I'm just spoiled.
Regardless of what I want
Yours truly most toil.
That way one day
I can embroil myself up north
And stop soiling my clothes
In this lemonade sunbelt
Of a South.

A beautiful sun shines through a palm's canopy
And casts a shadow over your beach retreat.
Sitting in a lounge chair with a rumrunner in hand,
It's easy to pretend people don't get murdered here.

Now it's nighttime and the city shines alive with neon
As countless youth hop from club to club looking for fun.
Walking down the boulevard while you take in the sights,
It's easy to forget the projects you passed to get here.

The next morning starts with a hefty hangover
And ends with a delicious bandeja paisa.
You've never had such exotically good food in your life,
Yet it's easy to ignore the famished begging on the streets here.

So the next time you visit
And feel all of your problems leave you,
Remember that your tourist dollars help keep our paradise
One fit for a fool.

Rimbaud watches me lay waste

his eyes like a rat's

from the bathroom tile

Christ watches me defile

atop high throne of bedroom wall

clock face keeps beat

as moans become wails

as ghosts grow taller

women grow older, shrinking

cars breed iron oxide, collapsing

on cinder blocks out window scrapyards

near hole in plaster

I turn to you like a child,

my cement blocks bleeding

"I hurt my hand"

A for Austerity, P for Poverty,
R for Recession, and U for Unemployment.
Recession is in town with her three

Un-amusing friends, whose hands are always
on their lips; and wherever the gang goes
they take away the fun from that place;

tinny Tanana biko biko! Whose car is
unemployment going to take away, to
make him use his leg-dis benz?

Eeny Meeny Miney mo! Whose house is poverty
going to crash in, and undo a
lifetime’s work in a matter of weeks?

tinny Tanana, biko biko! What will austerity
sell to the state? Is it a string for
the ministers to tighten the state purse?

Hear! Hear! Recession is in town. Bad
policies invited her with her three friends
to party and paint the town gray;

shame on the leaders on whose watch the
doors of the state were opened to recession
and her three friends; their ears will

be filled with the wailing and insults of the
populace, like the cry of a widow, whose
only son has passed away, fills the house.

He can’t sleep. He can’t speak. He just whistles. The wind works its way through his tight teenage lips, disrupting the subtly silent suburb. Frequencies fluctuate. In the distance a dog barks. Then another dog barks. The piercing sound of high pitched whistling doesn’t stop. Aside from his holey jeans, old flip flops, and smelly green shirt, whistling is all he has. The sound resonates with everything he is.

He whistles with the lost hope of love. There is a soft undertone of sorrow. His whistle is as beautiful as a piccolo. It is more fluid than a flute. Farther in the distance a mournful howl echoes in response to the whistle.

The night carries him onto a bus. One stranger stares scowling viciously.

Another strangers growls, “Shut the **** up.”

However, this pied piper cannot. He refuses to stop. The whistling continues.

        Up and down, it is a haunting sound. Fifteen minutes of whistling while the bus carries him home, to nowhere. Here there is an empty alleyway with a metal grate giving off waves of stray heat. He works his way to the one dumpster occasionally stocked with the days rotten left overs. To some the stench would turn their stomach, but to him it is sweet salvation.

An officers asks him to stop and show his I.D, to no avail. The request is repeated carrying a hint of arrogance and anger. Even so, the whistler is unable to stop. A hard hand grabs his wiry arms. They struggle, another officer joins the fray. Somewhere along the line a foot smashes against his ribs. He whistles for them to stop, pleading with his pursed lips. Steel toed shoes smash his gaunt face. The whistler finally stops.

The cops do not. Years’ worth of rage works itself out on the young man’s body. Inside his skull the whistling continues accompanied by a ringing. Pain singing and singeing his brain, leaves him breathless. This is nothing new. It is no worse than his history. The red welts, the black bruises, the damaged ear drums, and the broken larynx, all the scars from previous violence.

Violence meant to silence. Beatings that stole the words from his breaths. Speaking through the wind was all he had left. A secret language he kept to himself. The dead tell no tales. Instead the wind whistles back at a broken corpse.