do people need new prayers for inspiration?
or is it like classic rock--
the hoary old hits are the best?
might be more meaningful if we all
wrote something for ourselves
but it would have to be stupendous
i doubt we'd be up to it
it's like asking each of us
to compose our own bohemian rhapsody

an 80s tune with zippy synths and chirpy vocs
a song for happier times
you couldn’t sing a tune this bright now
there’s no audience for it

when i was a squirt
i hated winter
and swore that when i grew up
i'd move south
where they never heard of snow
but when i grew up
and saw who lived down south
i said **** it
i'd rather freeze my *** off
than hang with those people
and those people are probably just as glad
that i'm living in an igloo

i'm a genius
i'm a genius
i'm a genius
i'm a genius
i'm a genius
i'm a genius
i'm a genius
i'm a genius

hey, that guy's pretty smart

the election was rigged
the election was rigged

can’t complain about my two days off
cold january winter but i biked through the city
drank wine at cappy’s
hit up the library
brought the soup tour to the african veldt
posted poems in a couple of neighborhoods
recorded foppish puppyism with a cosmic *****
shot a famous vid of me singing lynyrd skynyrd
wrote three poems of utter profundity
posted a tiktok art vid
saw the latest matrix
(most interesting thing about it
was which aspect ****** the worst)
worked out
hung with my bride
played with the cats
watched tv
ecstasy x 2
nope
can’t complain

we have 350 pounds of quivering repugnance
oozing out of a nightmare into bed 3
he's a nice guy but my god
drooling rivers of foul juice from nose and mouth
his tracheostomy spewing mucus into every corner of the room
one of the more gruesome patients you’ll ever treat
for someone not an amputee or gunshot to the face
the nurse rockets from the room
"I JUST GOT HIS *** IN MY EYE," she wails
"WHAT DO I DO?"
we shrug our shoulders
wash her eye out?   quit nursing?
and how did THAT happen?
she tears down the hall to the attending physician
who tries to talk her down
"he actually has the cleanest *** in the unit," says the doctor
"his labs show there’s very little growing in there"
hard to swallow when assessing fright night in bed 3

a covid patient arrests
unvaccinated
hovering between here and gone
leaning towards death
her daughter comes in the room as we’re scrambling
to keep her heart beating and oxygen saturation viable
"i know you guys are thinking she’s gonna die
we need her alive
we NEED you to believe that she’s going to live"
a sad rush of emotion
a vaccine might have been more effective
than my happy thoughts
but that’s how it works on my planet
on her planet, who knows?