It was the watermelon diet, he said
That's what killed me

A lie as ripe as the freshest rind

Listen to the man
He was there at my deathbed

Though he never cared for my diet

It was the watermelon diet
not some virus
That consigned me to the Gods

The watermelon diet

Why now do they doubt my exotic pallet?
They've turned a blind eye to everything else
until now

For months, I guzzled nothing but sweet watermelon
Fat mounds of flesh between my greedy cheeks
The sheer volume of water left me bloated
Before I shed an immense amount of baggage

What else could be to blame?

Enough of your questions and on to the cremation
We'll see whether watermelon burns immortal

It began in Africa- no lie there
And comes in seedless varieties
I never planted mine
Though I wasn't want for trying

I can still taste the bitter juices as I lay here in my crypt

An artful coroner smelt a rat
Or a chance- to prove his mettle
Never heard of any watermelon diet
This is Palm Springs not Papa Nu Guinea

A sample of tissue foiled our grand conspiracy
Same thing that got Rock Hudson
But they kept a straight face
Kept to the story, mindful of my legacy

I'm not just any ******
Takes something grand and elaborate to dispose of me

An immigrant farmhand once told me “watermelon cure the AIDS”
And I believed him
At least that's what I'd have you believe

End

Spark kissed tinder
burst into flames
As men gathered in tight knots
Stitched up a street riot

Wood warmed and glowed
Militant revolution minds
The embers hummed with ashes
As city streets burned

Tyres and tubes were rolled
home brew guzzled
Fuelled the fires further
more streets burned

Water cannons hissed
As men aflame with anger
Lit fireplaces up alleyways
With burning brain torches

Taking the political fireplaces
To the palace of no return.
As soon as the government
Dissolved into a carpet bombing
puddle

The big bear
licked  its paws.

Author Notes

The Revolution continues after a lapse of two months.  Most politics start around a fireplace fuelled by alcohol and hate. Once lit the fireplace chatter
moves into the street and spread rapidly.

The  Bear anticipates a breakdown of law and order and amasses its troops along the border.
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved, a month ago

We wore torn blue jeans,
the holier the better,
pearl-buttoned shirts
& pointed Justin's
rounded out
our tough-guy
wardrobe.

We guzzled whiskey
& Crown
& told most folks
to kiss our *****,
even the coppers.

The pretty lasses loved us
& some had bigger ***** than us,
they tried to capture our hearts
& make real men out of us.

Sometimes
they succeeded
& sadly,
sometimes not,
our common sense
clouded
by alcohol-laced
testosterone.

I lost a lot of precious time
trying to be cool.

The battle is upon us
We can finally put ourselves to the test
Memories of the past still haunt us
We fight for freedom so that our minds can rest
Easy knowing that we took a stand
Against twisted beasts of human form
I hold my blade in a trembling hand
I'm ready to weather this mighty storm

I thought i was a man ready to protect
but now i can't even stand *****,
watching my team mates feet and necks
be crushed by these mountains of dreck.
I have't even started combat but i am seeing the light
now here one comes what is the point of putting up a fight?

Most of us won't see tomorrow
Why is Armin so frightened?
Is he just going to stand there
And get eaten by a titan?
I need to protect him
He's one of the last things I've got
And I can't let a monster dissect him
My targets locked
I'm going in for the nape
This wretched creature
Will never escape

Without being able to solve this place's puzzle
I will my life will end by being guzzled
By a ******* belligerent beast
Only looking for its next feast
How could we have a king when these monstrosities rule this domain
Our society might all as well burst like there's a flame over propane
It is a fitting end for this monarch's curious servent
being killed by the real king for being too observant
Hey I am a king too I guess... of cowards, my friend's blood is my moat
And their pieces of the mangled bodies will be my mink coat
Now I am slipping down this demons throat, it doesn't matter who I am
***** this... Wait what is this grabbing my hand?

I won't let him go
What lies beyond these walls?
We've always wanted to know.
How could he surrender to fear?
The look in his eyes
We can't die here.
I'll trade my life to keep his going
As I slip into the belly of the beast
My sense of urgency is growing
All I see are the bodies of comrades who have tasted defeat
The light is fading
Why is existence so bleak?

Prometheus gave fire
to humanity and had
his innards guzzled
by vultures for it.

You gave me the sun
and I
unduly set myself
wholly
to the task of tearing
apart your insides.

Top to bottom, I stripped you
strip you,
will strip you
of all that makes you you and
I don't know how to stop
turning your yellow
to orange
to purple
to black
like my innards too. See,
I too once gave fire
to people and lovers and friends and
then
I set myself to the task of
tearing up apart
those various necessities that made me
me. Things like basic human kindness.
Simple rules like don't
involve yourself with so many girls
that you lose count while never losing
count. That sort of
thing, y'know.

Do you know how long I've been
trying to write you a poem called
Darjeeling? I've been trying  for
so long that I drink coffee now.

I've been trying for so long that
when the restaurant menu finally
reads 'Darjeeling tea' for so and so
price, I don't pay it and order
some mediocre hot-chocolate instead
(and even a Strawberry milkshake. What
does that say about me, I wonder?).

It was lukewarm. It didn't scald
my tongue like you did.

I suppose it never will.

Although flummoxed by the gabble of hibernaculum I seethe with the verdant quiddity that is a cross-pollination that spans the gamut of historical memory and owns the usucaption of infrastructure equipping our bootstrapped capacities of literacy tethered to the ecumenical capacity for proliferation through amplified discernment that percolates at decorative gallop into the stridor of unified apothegms that quantify the visibilia of the broadened universe into the nexility of formula bounded by the parameters that equip synergies of space-time to envelope its own reification and magnetize urbane freebooters of coalescence to grapple with the ineffable mathematics of absorbed losses in the human fraternity becoming overlooked because of the providence of shepherded acrimony to escape the oblivion of barely marginal exponential extinctions of impropriety into fast-paced panoramas of expedited dalliance with optimums constrained by the effluvia of hinderbaggle which exist only by domineering mercurial lability of manufacture enabled by the siphon of Promethean reason to catapult the slogmarch of advancement by punctuated achievements registered by canonical gravitas to revolutionize society in longevity and interplanetary awareness that places a 1000:1 premium on a 165 IQ in comparison to a 110 IQ. Although bewildered by the beaucoup of raxed originality the anoegenetic flux of slogan achieves but a petty solidarity in comparison to the galvanized bronteum of registered invention that provides decisively seminal locomotive prowess to the foisons of promulgated ingenuity propped up by the capacity for raltention that exceeds the inherent longevity of humans on Earth into the permanence of memory to achieve radical vanguard frontiers within diminishing frames of a once vapid time recorded only through the lens of finicky preoccupations of crude retention rather than the kinship of the perceptive unity of the authors who remarked on history to share the same vantage with the distant onlookers upon that very history with such a convergence of judgments the photons that trespassed on inquisitive eyes of inquierendo are the very same blueprint for the modern savory traipse with selfsame perceptions embedded in canonical history like the spool of an exact daydream unfurled before inoculated eyes differentiated by context but achieving the same visual footprint of historical lineament provided by the original exemplar. The luxury of our provisional prosperity is the unique ability to browse spontaneously a two-century travail of perceptible records embedded in the same perceptual rudiments captured by the original vetuda thereby enabling the specificity of prowess to vicariously encounter distant gulfs of time with the simultaneous realization of past becoming present tense because beyond the revisionism of the censors the human lineage originates in approximated design tethered to the aboriginal photographs and hallmark expenditures of celluloid digitized into annealed constellation to provide separate junctures in space time with the same indelible percept decontextualized but potent by showcase of the verdure of the generosity of shared perception rather than cleaved faint traces of divergent imagination conceiving junctures by distal lurches of insular harbors of private registries of tact and discretion without the shared raltention of the plevisable entities that populate the fragmented lineage of space-time to achieve full congruence in percept first and abstract eventually as neuroscience slogmarches with the nockerslug of invidious depredation of sanctanimity. Adrift in iconoduly sustained by lambent monasticism of abnegation we were lost widows of insular idiosyncrasies of similar concepts separated by the longevity of imagination redacted into communicable formula to ensure the divergence of impact of liturgies heterodyne by vast distances but linked to archaic designs that formed the paradigms which eventually merged with the wiseacres of Renaissance conserved in momentum over centuries into the information capital that forms the futtocks of the girdle of a womb matrix of society sustained by a newfangled uniformity of exposure that slowly churns the collectivism of memory and the syndication of the cartel into the ubiquity of prominent thorns of perception magnified by iconography of the megalography of historical permanence evasive of censors and embracing the entelechy of coherent perceptions siphoned by different engineers but arriving at precisely the same conceptual imprint thereby unifying the perceptual world with the usucaption of leveraged networking of browsers of antiquity. The finesse of leapfrogs of modern human impediment is to scour the reaches of the troves of the most vivid imagination and expedite the turnstiles of conserved rollercoasters of enthusiasm probed by the cadasters capable of castophrenia to syndicalize the autonomy of human perception sejungible from indelible vivid footprints of abstraction upon an interface of truly hard-won vehicles of transmissible abstraction to win the arduous relish of once a vacuum of infested instinct into an algorithm of an intelligent source that creates the precise conditions of parallax to seed through celestial hosts the flourishes of stereodimensional traces of permanent cadaster into something that elects beyond the ethereal snatches of oblivion the provisional apportionment of sentiment above continence to set ablaze the rarefaction of raltention and quantify the intelligible impact of one artifact of civilization over the constellated taxonomy of all apothegms within the divine grasp of a sublunary eternity revived and recycled into syndicated scrutiny that bows to a convergent entelechy of instantaneous improvisation of perdurable registry into indemnities that litigate the humorous quizzical trangams of vastly outmoded obsolescence borrowing from panspermatism of technocracy to the edgy appeal of scintillating horizons of peerless scope that approximate the ommateum of approximated omniety but never span far enough for the distant riometers to see for deputized galaxies to be evoked in concrete human-alien achievements sempervirent and virulent guardians of the toil of sensation to refract off of its overhang because of redundant upbringing to shelve the incendiary impediments of the chary into the corsairs of revelation beyond gamuts of lurch and bypassing elapsed regress to arrive at ceremonial progress to trespass upon many minds with a unified concrete hypostasized entelechy of a fielded incorporation of organic life into a manufactured cycle of the most prolonged and beatific longevity capable of digestion and implementation from the toolsheds of hubris accelerated by the vainglory of subsidized harmonies that break through the barriers of language to sprout convergence in direct opposition to entropy to achieve oculate ommateum.The opponents to the logical syndicalism of positivism emergent as the verdant drape of homogenized pasteurization of raw lavaderos that capsize swallock and devour consciousness with predatory mobilism is the tregounce of the ponderous imprints of recapitulated stupidity which is easy to quantify in terms of human rarity because the difference between a 130 IQ and a 155 IQ is a difference in ingenuity power than exceeds 25:1 or an even higher margin of liquidation of indebted concatenations forming the flombricks of capitalized language finessed into burgeoned growth to radically shift postulates into abstract precision that observes the flanges of the dominion of inculcation into the filibusters of gainsay that supersedes hearsay in an evolution of the dialectic to exert transformative esemplastic rejuvenation that transcends creed and ingeminates the festivity of spectacle with the alvantage of albenture to such an extent it predicates new modalities of persiflage grounded on the aggressive patented expansion of the noosphere to inherit the instincts of orthobiosis while simultaneously inheriting the flair of redoubled ingenuity swarming with the vespiaries of predatory discretion working to ***** out glaring beacons of sapience so that intellectual capital is a local rather than ubiquitous emergence because of the prizes of urbacity enhanced by systems of masonic creed that preserved foresight with varying degrees of exactitude knowledgeable about outcomes but incidental in creating those outcomes out of the alchemy of the convergent sphere of spacetime to curve to synclastic pancratic refinement realized in the taxation of the most domineering figures of canon to indoctrinate the inkburch of wernaggle while the panorama of peripheral obscurity adduced by the resourceful few provides the progeny for a seminal equation that encounters the quandaries of precise retention amplified by the synergies of language exponentially grown by the depth and breadth of lexicon siphoned through mechanisms of percolation seeded by the convergent progeny of hindsight meeting foresight to a truce in the elected interests of the filagersion of the spotlight highlighting a universe that only exists with self-aware reification rather than plodding animated instincts of a stagnant match with a slowpoke evolution that scrawls the gabble of the vacuums of faint oblivion knowing only pain, agony and brief felicity but never registered into ecosystems capable of enriching themselves with artifices of origination rather than vapid retrenchments of the stale vapor of the exigencies that plague the intellectually bereft with tertiary deskandent perfunctory desuetude outstripped by the parsecs of the 170 crowd who secretly orchestrates the think tanks that run the furtive cryptadia of regional governance with foisons of fruition realized as dividends of exponential bypasses of even a linear route of the streamline by warping time itself to a spontaneous entelechy that triangulates a warped trigonometry that fathoms what can only be mapped on an imaginary flickering plane of fluxed existence that achieves sub-Pythagorean travel by altering the vacillating distances predicated by the theory of relativity into shortened tracts of abbreviation separating the bridgewaters of locomotion from the vast lurking prowess of reconfigured geometries lurking beyond the shadowy grave of reconnaissance into the penumbra of conservatory refinement. The punctual symmetries of thermodynamic decay met with a conversant offset in reverse acceleration of thermolysis converge with the centripetal prism of annulment to make stalemates of atomic precision appear grandiose to the economic principle of leverage acquired by debt because the discounted cost of symmetrical approximations of sentiment, abstraction and the already syndicated unity of perception vastly scale the scope of the reach of the amenable universe to tractions bound more by eccentricity of parameterized volumes of competing hyperbolas of a warped unity of tugging forces spawned by the differential weights of a flummoxed calculus that provides obeisance in ecumenical uniformity that was absent by degrees through the tinkers of time to adjust the orbits of consideration by tilted warbles of the songbirds that swim in abysses reaching sizable celestial tutelage providing reprisal for quintessential crudity mapped into a syntax of evolved refinement amplified by conserved concatenation accelerated into mastery by the coalescence of new lexicon to probe conceptual space unchartered by the nexility of normal human conduct and therefore bound to a different pattern of evolution that is oleaginous to the engines of revved ostentation in intellectual prowess that is selfsame from the majesty of heaven because of preordained populace meeting transitory flickerstorms twinged with the irony of discursive disclaimer and discretion of disclosure of emissary vehicles that power synaptic vesicles to burst with signal strength harnessing the unity of conscientiousness into a coenesthesia that fathoms interdisciplinary bridges rarely exacted by the formulas of a more rudimentary mind demarcated in taxonomies of scope that are taxemes for unrealized entelechy bristling against the headwinds of doldrum rather than zephyrs of accelerated approximations of the enumeration of elaborate sveldtang into seminal traversals of the inhibitory grasp of narquiddity exceeded by the alacrity of provident discretion in apportioned judgment enough to parameterize vast distances with instantaneous wiseacres rather than rippled mirrors of faint simulations of simultagnosia bounded by the regional scope of subliminal etches of harnessed flombricks invisible to most aptitude measures of working memory but evocative of subroutines that flourish because of the cross-pollination of exasperated sapience clambering for a perpetuity of renewable raltentions conveyed widely and succinctly in indelible tacenda broached by the wisest sophrosyne inclinations to survive the onslaught of traditional nexilities that make obtuse minds hardened by slowpoke myelination and hidebound parameters of achieved convention recursive on reiteration but not expansive on the tracts of genius reserved for the asylum boundary between insanity of delusion and bountiful riches of harvested non-conventional imagination which sometimes pollutes the integral provenance of rapid conveyance. True transcendence is summarily defined as outpacing pace itself to visibly outfox the forsifamiliation of events perceived as distance sworn by the ability of the accelerated frontier to understand the vestiges of the outmoded to the extent redintegration can surpass with imagination beyond the tethers of quddity that narrowcast swallock but refine the space that distances itself from magnitude and achieves a limited vetuda that phenomenalizes the redacted plucky perjury of self-anonymity to identify a novel visibilia of characterized clarity only specialized to the extent the vast sphere of retention exerts a gravitas over footloose fragments of disunity to surpass the skeumorphs of the trailing bolides of distant comets to avoid by meteoric trajectory the lapse incumbent to E=MC^2 which guarantees implicitly in the barter of nebbich chalky rigmarole that the energy of refinement is an abstraction limited only by the coherence of marginal dumose decay to estrange inertia as plevisable from motion and thermolysis as sejungible in partition what cannot be summarily be filibustered by the succedaneum of shortchanged shorthand convenience of the credulity of those who perceive dynamism of delivery as an easily fudged quandary not restrained by the logarithmic slowdown of conservatory inseminations of panspermatism of invention. The riddle of the enigma of neuroscience that presides over classifiable qualia is that the outstretched rax of rectiserial reorganization must gradatim invoke spurious prestige to predicate the entrapment of narrative exponentially slower than the impregnated literacy of an integral harpsichord of mind to finesse the octaves so that sublime majesties become superlative ringleaders of seditious conventions embedded more by absorptive brocrawlers than expressive werniques. We must fashion an orthobiosis that is leniency embodied but plenitude outnumbered by the progeny of its sculpted riches for extravagant spools of tapestries of refinement to be the imprints of legacy compounded by the complexities of inheritance in lineaments situated in the context of overhanging specters and domineering prospects swimming by commonwealth acatelepsy in a maelstrom of revived gammerstang notions of impetuous apostasy benighted by the macroscian and macrobian spans of the captive capture of a Taylor Series of infinite expenditure assuming perpetuity that necessarily converges on organization because of conscientious reversals of entropy into ladders of betrayal against the hegemony of ******* over the synquests of hortoriginality that spurn the castigations inherited from its immodesty of permutation to fixate on global problems of intricacy ragged in salebrosity bereft of the marginal galvanization of hidden inquirendos into artifice contingent upon elapsed epiphenomena of compounded rigmarole resonant with a simplified system of hostage complicity to a least common denominator that belongs to suboptimal refrains issued by Procrustean forces against demassified parsecs of bounded limitations exceeding the volume of perceptible shadows recessive in the alleles of culture but eventually transmogrified into teetotaler totalitarian principles of grave gravities of tabanids to the aceldamas of territorial joust rather than annealed irony of the recidivism of the plucky thorns of percurrent but latent vehicles for oppression to swamp the lethargy of durative formation such that the hambourne atrocity of hambaskets of hinderbaggle grapple mostly with the adolescent excesses of milked pleonexia becoming the downfall of cagey imprisoned syntax bereft of capable constellation and thereby stranded in vagrant proclivities that net positive only in the rare grandeur of my formative axiom of the axiolative excesses of my recensed definition of transcendence. The vacant harbor of asylum of abiding auctions of flexible transistors of wealth is inherently a poolswap of attractive chocolate-box travestime of incurred wreffalaxity suborning the lewd machination of funneled flipcreeks to the commerstargall of incendiary glaciers basking in boardrooms of ataraxic placations of commiseration found in dynamos lamenting degraded embodiments of regaled regelation as seasonal flictions of submerged vanity vaporizing the wisps of whimsical bloated grievances of paltry imparlance to the defalcation of a filigree of mind only sustained by the steady churlishness of preserved relic hibernating in brocrawler pleonasm to grindole the welter of spates of vapid deceleration of successful vibrancy measured in the gamut of hues to exact a penultimate ruse before the finitude of the capstone of capers of fiat remission slick with glamborge of gallionic sciamachy prone to revelry in the cretaceous extinction of monochromatic mathematicization of gradgrind visagists toying with the treacle of blue-sky action billowed into toxic spurts of contrarian aggression of herculean appendages of hackumber providing the bronteum of recidivism to vanquish a righteous trajectory on a pause of Canada Dry conveniences sultry in daft hipsters of tilted stage grafting conclusion prior to rapport of introduced variables of poignant tethers of necessary succor for a desiccated bastion of hidden unspoken reach fizzling into trangams of obsolescence because of perennial inebriations that thwart strong character to scandalize a pinhoked vessel of conscientious objection to the radiology of centerpiece hapless forlorn arid squelches of the vibrant verdure of macrobian dumose shelter for reformatories that invent incidentally accidents otherwise precluded by the ommateum of wasted foresight guzzled on the premium of disaster for a showcase of verve going awry steamy with livid filagersion aimed with a reluctant enmity against the cagey headwinds of recalcitrance inveterate to the scruples of the otherwise unscrupulous who foist lewd licentious philandered paragons of philogeant mysticism to forefront cowcatchers that eliminate kumbaya rijuice of gridlock impressionism guarded by the sentinels of rambunctious destructive attempts to evict intellectual propriety from careens of subtlety barnstorming with polyacoustic nuances of differential gradients of vapid bastions of strident but backwards versamily froward and bountiful of Head Hunter specters rather than heaved recombinations of orthotropism wed with mangers of savory dilettantism of the lionized array of brooks branching into rivulets and the fluminous barnstorm of pelagic awareness interrupted by the finicky prevarications of piggybacked fair-weather allies who secretly fund the slander for the mainour of dirt fundamental to meteoric rises acclimated to dissipated moral vacuums of disbelief of evidentiary miracles among the jostle of scientific regency that slakes opprobrium to illiteracy while benefiting greatly from my perceived barathrum that is rather a crowning ravenous achievement of appetite above substance and distinction varied from prediction that my Titanic zalkengur spared from the unnecessary sacrilege of less accommodating curglaff to the metaphorical hypothermia of albatross in dramaturgy rather than a pause glowering with mastery against my jarred enemies preying on weakened reach due to preeminent dirges of inkburch and swallock to ravage my sanctity with a hyped stage without a starlet daydream fantasia spectacle that is calculated to upstage even in the coverthrow of intelligentsia against the plodding boweries of pestilential raving resentment absconding with elusive enmity rather than cherishing a true trident champion of the seized seas and the traindeque of emulated intellectual accordions of claptrap chockablock pedigree that outlast gallywow afflictions of rapacious venality tenacious to the detritus of constructive detriment building the ashes of effigy before I am dead and buried with the storge of perennial legacy rather than scandalous privation of the obolary tenets of desecration above reabsorption of mendicant bodges of the bodewash of freedom’s counterstrokes of maskirovka ineradicable and plenipotentiary wit deniable but legacy ineffable by degrees of exponential long-winded flambeaus of filagersion swiveling with recessive rubble in a crenellated fortress guarded with tripwire insubordination against cordslave dependencies liable to recurrent reproach rather than sustainable filigrees of electrified balkanization toxic to the aquifers of modernity streamlining Roman imperium. To this flajoust I owe eternal behest as the captaincy of time is not a perishable whangam of superstition an affront to a provident rejoinder of verifiable prestige because the curvature of time favors the ripple effect of magnetized reninjuble charms alerted to upward soaring skies of inevitable peerless dominion in the  perceived symphily of competing benevolence with a shared stake in Earthly pulchritude emanating a sworn allegiance to the best interests of philosophical enlightenment

Once upon a time,
there was a girl who drank the moon
gurgled and guzzled until it filled her,
moonlight shimmering through her skin
and stardust lingering in her veins
she was waxing and waning
and the tides followed her small feet,
every month she shrunk into herself
before being born anew
glorious and whole and bright
bright enough to rival the sun
and how the sun loved her so,
his gaze warmed her back every day of her life
kissing her softly as she grew into the silver
that was her skin, her hair, her eyes
and how the night welcomed her
she could hear stars whispering
see adoration in every glimmer
the girl grew and grew, and the silver shone
and she longed for her sun, his warmth
and for the stars, her friends
every night she would shine
she could light up the world with that shine
white and silver and brilliant
she was love incarnate
and so
was loved in return

T'was little fun
T'was a little town,
No virulent delirious runs
No irking sounds
As t'was a little dangling town

All t'was a feasible brew
No meanders to sought
No conundrums of anew
just wired timely things to rot

When all t'was a portent upcoming
For t'was clad and veneered
In a amicable sun-daze groaning

T'was a peaceful loop of mono-gradient seasons
and all to do was ponder
For t'was guzzled with reasons

T'was yesterdays jigsaw puzzle
T'was a nightmare in sun-light
But for now, let's retch our unknown dazzle

As t'was,
A flippant fuss
For what shan't be
A beguiling me

The year of Skinny Pop and sugar-free Jell-o cups,
we guzzled vitamin water and *****,
toasting to high school and survival
complimenting each other’s thigh gaps.
Trying diets we found on the Internet:
menthol cigarettes, eating in front of a mirror, donating blood
replacing meals with other practical hobbies like making flower crowns or fainting.
Wondering why I haven’t had my period in months
or why breakfast tastes like giving up
or how many more productive ways I could have spent my time today
besides Googling the calories in the glue of a US envelope.
Watching America’s Next Top Model like the gospel
hunching naked over a bathroom scale shrine
crying into an empty bowl of Coco Puffs
because I only feel pretty when I’m hungry.
If you are not recovering, you are dying.
By the time I was sixteen, I had already experienced being clinically overweight, underweight, and obese.
As a child, “fat” was the first word people used to describe me
which didn’t offend me until I found out it was supposed to.
When I lost weight, my dad was so proud.
He started carrying my before-and-after photo in his wallet.
So relieved he could stop worrying about me getting diabetes.
He saw a program on the news about the epidemic with obesity.
Said he is just so glad to finally see me taking care of myself.
If you develop an eating disorder when you are already thin to begin with, you go to the hospital.
If you develop an eating disorder when you are not thin to begin with, you are a success story.
So when I evaporated, of course everyone congratulated me on getting healthy.
Girls at school who never spoke to me before stopped me in the hallway to ask how I did it.
I say, “I am sick.”
They say, “No, you’re an inspiration.”
How could I not fall in love with my illness?
With becoming the kind of silhouette people are supposed to fall in love with?
Why would I ever want to stop being hungry when anorexia was the most interesting thing about me?
So how lucky it is, now, to be boring.
The way not going to the hospital is boring.
The way looking at an apple and seeing only an apple, not sixty or half an hour of sit-ups is boring.
My story may not be as exciting as it used to, but at least there is nothing left to count.
The calculator in my head finally stopped.
I used to love the feeling of drinking water on an empty stomach
waiting for the coolness to slip all the way down and land in the well,
not obsessed with being empty but afraid of being full.
I used to be proud when I was cold in a warm room.
Now, I am proud I have stopped seeking revenge on this body.
This was the year of eating when I was hungry without punishing myself
and I know it sounds ridiculous, but that **** is hard.
When I was little, someone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up and I said
“small.”

Waves from the beach match my waves for my drink
The waitress comes over and asks what’s my order
I said I can’t choose “I’m feeling like there’s clouds above me,
It’s been a rough few days and these double hotel rooms are bland and lonely.”
“Not a problem, sir.  I know just what to get to make you feel *****.
She comes back with a Hawaiian margarita.
It came with an umbrella which I set aside while saying thank you, Senorita.
I guzzled down the drink to reach the tequila faster,
But the wind picks up and it looks like a disaster.
I ask for one more, with the umbrella.
This fairy godmother returns with another margarita.
The buzz has transformed me like I’m Cinderella.
I leave a 20 at the table and walk towards the beach, ignoring the families with kids who all they do is screech.
Clutching both umbrellas, I walk to the shore
One of God’s many gifts for us to explore.
I never noticed how nice he made the decore.
Tequila is the only alcohol that’s an upper, or so I’ve been told.
But I enter the water even though it was cold
What happened next though was a story previously told,
My umbrellas caught air like Mary Poppins,
As I floated along the coast listening to Phil Collins.
The speakers down below blast the drum section from that one song,
And I stayed up there for I don’t know how long,
But when I descended,
My pain was suspended and my emotions were splendid.
So next time, when your mind feels cloudy and your thoughts are rowdy
Ask for a drink with an umbrella
You’ll soon find yourself smiling, cheesing more than mozzarella.

Crowds gathered and the noise of disobedience shook the neighbourhood whole. I was in the southern part of the city, where sinners sinned and the practitioners groomed the bars and off licenses solely to quench their thirst for liquor. It was almost midnight and hordes of young and old alike chanted and sung merry making song that rang through city; and what a noise it was. And it was on this night I met a lad who dressed as if the night belonged to him. A tall, slender fellow who hadn’t a care in the world. His Caribbean afro would bob up and down as we giggled to anecdotal stories of the past. We were rebels of the night, breaking away from the fragile unity that was the friendship circle.

A few stragglers in the form of Chavs had joined. Many of them formed bonds with the pretty girls, rivalling us out in the end. Deciding momentarily on what our next plan was, we split away from the group and continued midnight drinking into the Holy Lands. We could hear the barking of neighbourhood dogs tangle with the distant explosions of fireworks in the sky. It was beautifully chaotic. But as midnight sinners it was like music to our ears.

“I’m off mate, take care of yourself.” The fellow said as he guzzled his last remainder of his bottled Budweiser.

“You heading home, aye?” I smirked, clearly egging him on to stay out just a tad longer. But, this was to be it. With a hug and a good luck, he was off, towards the mystic backstreets and towards the Ormeau Road. I never caught the young lad’s name, nor did I ever catch his age. It was a strange meeting between the two of us. As if, for one singular night we knew everything about each other yet knew nothing at all. I recall sitting back down on the sidewalk and smiling, before looking up towards the decorative sparkly night sky. And, what turned out to be a spontaneous and random night ended up as a completed final chapter, to a superb little story.

On a humid mid-summer night
We traveled so far, yet so near
To a place of extravagant revelry
We had no idea what was to come that evening

It was an old-fashion party
Everything and everyone was illuminated
And why not?
It was the night of our celebration of freedom

Everyone was dancing and laughing
The sweat, the dilated pupils of the jubilant guests

I saw everything standing on the top of the wooden foothill

These stairs tested your level of intoxication
You could trip on them sober, they were so spread apart, numerous and inconsistent
And if you were drunk to the highest extent, you’d surely die trying to conquer them

We were swept away with a cold beer in each of our hands

A bearded man with a bottle of whiskey pored us shots
We downed them
And then another
In honor of the moment
And to the chance that our whiskey toting woman chaser would get laid that night

The evening was miraculous
Alcohol flowing like cool crystal rapids
*** being burned like drift wood on an unmapped deserted beach
And a vibe of comrodery between all in attendance

Digital pixilated snapshots to save this moment for nostalgic posterity

Beer pong seemed like an Olympic event

Kings
Flip cup
Thumper
Quarters

I took no part for I was too far gone by that point
I was a mere spectator
I was more interested in the various airborne angels floating in the ozone of ecstasy

I staggered up to each one individually trying to swipe a kiss or maybe even more

“Hi”
Kiss
SMACK

“Hi”
Kiss
SMACK

“Hi”
Kiss
SMACK

“Hi”
Kis­s
Kiss back

Whoa
Who
Was
This?

A familiar face

A gaping hole of pleasant surprise opened on my face
A look of false anger on hers appeared

SMACK!

We laughed and said hello then did a shot
***!

Then another

And talked
Our chuckles were reminiscent of an orchestral arrangement

The mother of our seemingly invisible host stood up and herded the whole party into a unanimous silent yield

“TEQUILA!” she shouted

And the whole backyard of sweaty, out of it, ***** young faces cheered and tapped the thumping music back on and formed a line

The bottles flew open like flimsy shutters during a maelstrom of wind

Limes and salt were being passed around like ten cent ******

After the last drop of tequila was guzzled down the party seemed to be swaying to and fro
And all of us had the same heavy eyed toothy smirk on us that says “yeah…I’m done”

The glorious angel that I had plucked from the heavens and I wandered to the corner of the commotion and perched ourselves in a high tree and kissed

And right below us two of our friends began to make indiscrete inebriated love to each other on a rusty swing set

Nice

But our passionate, fearless kiss blocked that out
It was so pure and shameless
Even though we both knew we were betraying the trust of our then insignificant others

The sound of bachata
The knocking of red solo cups  
Ping pong *****
And the ******* sounding voices of those trying to locate them
Were a loud soundtrack to our lustful voyage into each other’s comfort zone

We talked for what seemed like hours about how we were attracted to each other for so long
And how our relationships at the time left us unhappy and unfulfilled

We had a mindful understanding of one another
Neither of us had that before

But all of a sudden
The beer
The ***
The whiskey
And the tequila
All came back to say hello
Then goodbye as they flushed themselves out of my system and into our host’s garden

No one noticed
So I continued to relieve myself on the tomatoes and basil

The angel rubbed my back and let me go

And when it was done
She kissed me

Then and there I knew she was mine
And I was hers

Nothing mattered

Not my infinite bile projections
Not my unfit partner
Not my scarring past
Just her
Only her
Right there
Right then

We walked back to the epicenter of the soiree to see people leaving to go make their own myths of ****** endeavors
And the good friends sober enough to help their blacked out pals get home safely

So, my friend and I bid our goodbyes and thank yous to our friends and our host and their family and wobbled home
With a flaming heart and an empty stomach
Also a bladder full of bad decisions that I unleashed upon a parked dump truck on my journey home back to my bed

god flew through my coffee this morning;
an intellectual crow entered my apartment,
and it guzzled a sip of the holy brew
me? i didn't take notice, just took notes

a blind writer who seeks the extraordinary,
distracted by a strayed quest for himself
left eye red, the right one black, wolfishly
a tribe of suicidals shattered my eye sight

they were dancing in trance
they were singing in kid's voices:

"we forgotten who we are; our skins crumbling
we don't want to live inside your body; no!
we won't be your voice anymore; we be leaving

golemland is our destination, shelter of letters"
then, the tribe of suicidals left, depriving me of words

I have not injected myself, felt the pulse
of illegal things under the bonnet of my skin
or swallowed a pill and let the room swirl
in colours from the mid-sixties.

I have not guzzled ugly orange drinks
until my liver aches to talk
and I erupt pints and shots
against ***-coated cubicle walls.

I have not had the awkward first
with one of my teeth knocking on hers
or a line of saliva in my stubble
that I perhaps should have trimmed.

Instead I drink tea with two sugars
and whizz through each channel
rather than absorbing stories for class
as best I can like a square of kitchen roll.

Instead I see streams of people from 20-whatever
take pictures with berries and apples
to remind themselves who they are
and remind me they still breathe.

And instead I write what I don't know
for if not every word burns black then dies
and so I continue to fight the other me
who will not turn, walk back the way I just came.

no one is around
i walk down the streets of a vacant wasteland
forgotten, discarded, tattered
red cups drag across asphalt
with no force pushing them but the
tired alcohol stained breath of the wind.
this beautiful sunday morning-tainted
by the drunken cheers of last night
the life-poured, guzzled, shot
out of this place
death hangs over the streets while a
drunken hibernation swallows my
"highly esteemed" peers.
shattered glass cracks beneath
my feet as i follow the pathway
to my house; to my successes
this place…
this is home.

She was a spectacular tree.
People called her the flame of the forest,
for she was obviously striking, vivid and classy.

I need not narrate the superlative majesty
of the flame – tree, for one time or the other
we have all been breath-taken by her peerless glamor.

What matchless artistry!

I am here to quickly share
my ruminative gloom for that lovely assembly
of flower, leaf and wood, which grandly stood
in a grove of possibilities, and possibilities can be
such a torment, such a calamity.

❋

For years galore, caterpillars of choices
had been steadily eating away at her core.
They came from different directions,
at different trajectories,
with varied objectives
and fluctuating proclivities.

Sometimes, they came rushing in as family,
and sometimes they came slowly,
a little formally, a bit watchfully,
somewhat officially.

At times they came in fiery fascination
and yet, ever so often, they were charged
with marauding indignation.

Many times they arrived as blazing ambition,
but more often than not, combusted the flamboyance
leaving behind an ashen illusion.

Oh.....those craving larvae
of oblique, wily opportunities.

❋

The foliage was feverishly guzzled
till photosynthesis was no more possible.
From my distant window from where I had once
watched her variegated flair,
I felt the Poinciana moan in simmering despair.

❋

With biting sensitivity, I still look on, a tad tearfully,
as she continues to tumble into conscious torpidity.

My words may slip and sway, as with each wilting leaf
after each withering floret, she progresses towards
an abject decay;
imploding methodically, and transposing gradually
from being the flame of the forest
to being a sprouting forest of flames.

i've really messed up
my whole life now f
                                    a
                         ­              l
                                         t
                                           e
                                             ring
slowly   each moment pushed
on my heart   a   l i t t l e  h e a v i e r

waiting for it to ...BURST...
and blow us all    p
                             U
                          ^^^^
i just don't know what could've been done+

preventing a storm :
only works when you know
it's going to come, coME, COME!
-not- when you're in the eye
•
tOo   tOnGuE     tIeD to speak
and just to hürt to try


ive gr0WN accustomed to
        u  m
the l        p    in the throat
the damming of ~water~ behind eyelids                                          f  c
the quivering of my reddened  a  e
and the knifē through the back to my heart

isn't it a shhhhhhame when pain is so common                         B O
and we learn HOW to T  T
                                        L  E   it up       y
and where to store it so                      a
nobody se•es                                    w
                 only   ..   to be hiding it a
from those who gave you heartbreak
                         $         !
and still they act surprised,
                   and condemn you
                   *  *   *   *             tops
when you    POP    off the ^^^
and DrrrüNK enLY g..g..guzzled them all

Ages ago, I danced
with a kind of devil
wearing leopard-spandex
through a tempest fire.

We guzzled spirits,
nuzzled in each other's arms
as we circled the sun,
whirled around the moon,
kissed every star
in the heavens above.

She put a hex on me
& I survived, still looking
for a white dove,
some peace of mind.

We meandered by four-wheel drive
way up into phantom canyon,
got lost in the blm land,
parked forty-five degrees,
amongst the conifers.

We guzzled the golden brew
& in short order,
found ourselves
wearing our birthdays suits,
amongst the conifers.

For sure we had found heaven,
her gripping the roll bar
& me,
hanging on for dear life,
amongst the conifers.

Bailey sat at the kitchen table. stiring her coffee and staring out of a ***** bay window at an old apple tree covered in snow. "i guess that all of the birds have flown south for the winter." she sighed, hugging herself as the cold wind blew through her. "who cares about those disgusting rats with wings anways?" jacob rolled his eyes and guzzled his coffee down, finishing it all with one big gulp. "i do, they're beautiful." bailey argued. "you used to love birds." she continued. "i used to love birds... before you started feeding them all of the bread." jacob complained with a playful smile. "besides i love voltures and falcons." he smiled. "i feed the birds old bread that nobody wants... and of course you do." B ailey shook her head, grinning from ear to ear.

An Island on a
Brink of collapse,
Leakages on our
national budgetry,
Cronysm and Inept
speeches seizes
Powerful seats.
Our national oil
Reserves Guzzled
down by twit Politicians
women Aspiring for
change by Denying
their Husband Conjugal
Rights.
Millions of unemployed
youths run Amok
causing a Frenzie
country-wide,
Anarchy spells Doom
across the
country.
State of Internal
security is a vital
sign for the Failure
of our current
Governments.
Reforms of national
cohesion and a new
constitution seems
like a Fantasy to
many Africans.
Our cumbersome
Judiciary procedures
discourages Investors,
so goes the Plea
of Desolate souls
in Africa.........

Start for the dart of the mart
Quarts of coolant guzzled down
A meal A break a heart that is no longer beating
Now the clouds are opened
And I see there was nothing there at all
Mind matters in the eyes prying for a cry
The little girl inside this one is no longer there
She has gone away to another place
I am sick I am tired I am a broken record atop a spinning player
Each hour that passes through this still place makes it seem as if nothing is real
As if the haze in mine eyes is the fog on a morning knolls break
Faster then any bullet we will die
Quicker then any hummingbird love will dissipate into a memory only captured
In torn and worn photographs
Kept by people that need something to talk about at dinner
At Christmas
At Thanksgiving
At times when the truth is so close
We all must shut it away
To go on is to prolong the fat fact that we winners are winding down a rocky
Rembrandt like
Painting of puke and bile and smiles which do not bring either happiness
Or heartbreak
Who is this person inside this mind that will not let me be?
Who put this brain inside of me?
Who allowed for these trials of touch and go to commence?
And who will be at the finish line when I am too exhausted to go on?
I am neither here nor there nor awake or asleep
I wander from the middle to the coast only to start wandering again
To be elevated from above the Earth
To be floating along
Is to see the world in the haze of which I speak which is Heaven
Where bugle playing baby angels sip on lemon cloud swirl drinks
Where death no longer lays its heavy hand upon any head
For He is there as well
We are all welcome to the corner market where behind door number two
Is a running river lined with no ***** pebbles
But broken fragments of dragon's gold
To take to this place is to lose your face for to drift one must pay
Yes
One must always pay
To play

I have tasted her
a million times (or more),
guzzled her sweet,
sweet,
sweet laced-nectar,
way deep,
deep,
deep,
deep
inside my yearning soul.
I am intoxicated
on her delicious-elixir,
she is my only fix.
So she must,
she must know
by now,
I crave,
I choke,
I burn for her.
For these
are her hiccups
I release
forever.
And I do thank her
from
the bottom
of my drunken-heart,
for making me tipsy,
inebriated,
so ****** smitten
on her mouth-watering
cherry-concoction.

Bitter wine in the tone of your voice

Falsely soothing and secure like laughing gas

With this rhythmic beat that lulls me

As I silently sip from your cup and absorb the parts of you

The fermented time spent in your arms

That reveals it's worth in the days stored away

Purple stained lips of pleasure left by your kiss

While I stumble off, dizzied by our bliss

Lost in the whirlwind of promises

Because you give me a faulty sense of self

With the cloak of guzzled dreams we've made

But when we fail the darkness lays it's vail before my eyes

So that tomorrow I forget the shattered glass

And become intoxicated by you again

Drunken with the bitter wine in the tone of your voice

Falsely soothing and secure like laughing gas

of course the sun peeled another layer of my onion skin
barbecued and burnt to a crisp finish
like lettuce in a deep dish of saucy
spices and herbs, coriander and cumin parsley and pain
thyme and rhyme, sage and age
beer and blue bottle flies
all in the name of  nature.

soon the dialogues became dialects and grandpa
guzzled too much ale so he went off to nourish
a rose bush discreetly behind the party pack
of people, swirling about in champagne glasses
and tight skirts tempting us slowly getting drunk voyeurs
with glimpses of heaven and tight buns
packed with ham and cheese and spikes of hot
chilli *******
all in the name of the great outdoors.

as the son set in the evening sky old dad
was eyeing up a guest on her third bubbly
her thinking swerved quickly to burnt sausages.
I was still enjoying the barbecued chick
with the two toned honeysuckle skin
and 34DD sized mushroom concockion
and that, my friends, was purely my nature.

when night came around in a flimsy dress
which showed figures of mountains and sparkles
the ideas in my head bruised by too much *****
buns, bottles and bronze conquests
had to answer the call of nature.

I returned to a field of many victories
grandpa was tending roses head down in the dirt
dad had disappeared with his 34DD mushroom delicacy
Mom was busy discussing politics with a horn-rimmed
gentleman, who this minute would take off
his spectacles and put on his testicles
and I went to bed with hot buns waiting.
all in natural instinct!

Author Notes

An evening party on a  nice barmy day with guests gathered to enjoy nature and all its offerings. Nature is to blame if things went a little astray. Nature does that!
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.

You left "I love you" in my lungs
So I chained smoked cigarettes to fill them with nicotine.

You left butterflies in my stomach
So I guzzled alcohol to make them drown.

You left hope in my soul
So I popped some pills to make it numb.

You left passion in my body
So I expired my meals to make it disappear.

You left me with memories
So I gave myself scars.

You won’t remember this
but that time we sat
on the steps of your cousin’s place
in Brooklyn, Hewes St., one October night,
where we stayed out
and talked till three A.M.,
our fingers chapped,
our noses tinged crimson.
I remember it because
you were cold and I gave you
my jacket, the black one
I’d only just bought the day before
and you said wow, look at those goosebumps
popping up along your arms,
but sorry, I’m colder, I’m wearing this now.
We’d been to see a concert
at Madison Square Garden,
and they were all there,
Billy, Dave, Hayley,
to celebrate your birthday five days early.
They knew, you knew
every single word,
hurling them at the band
like verbal snowballs,
your hair a brunette blur,
strobe lights in our eyes.
We left with headaches
bursting open as flowers,
sweat trapped in my fringe.
Dave was into you,
did I ever mention that?
He’s been to see you
and sometimes speaks
but he finds it difficult.
We all do if I’m honest.
Anyway, we took the F
and then the J.
By 11.56 we were tired
but not quite tired enough.
I was going to walk you home
but we never left those steps.
We looked up and down the street,
said what cars we liked and why.
A Honda HRV, avocado-green
stood out to you, a hulking skeleton of metal
I said looked ugly.
You were lonely then.
Any attention was guzzled up, I could tell.
I rambled on so much
it stopped sounding English
but there was giggling, smiling,
puffs of breath whirling away from us.
You told me your only friend
was your reflection in store windows.
Surely not true.
We all said that.
Hayley told you to snap out of it
but you didn’t know how to snap out.
And when you rang on Friday morning
we all should have listened,
clutching our phones
making sense of it all.
Now you won’t remember
and there’s blood on my wrist.
that came from someone else.

I've chewed the leaves,
lots of them
to ease the pain.
I've guzzled chicha
seeking a vision,
danced
the traditional
spiral
to pan pipes
and a trumpet.
And I've seen
piles of bones
as far as the eye can see
out on the Altiplano,
bleached by the sun,
basking in the rain
for a millennium.

You swallowed
And I swear I went down
Your throat

You gulped
And I swear you guzzled
Me up

You drank
And I swear every drop
Of me

You quit
And you swore to God,
To me

You relapsed
And I swear I’m trapped in
Your bottle

You left "I love you" in my lungs,
so I chain smoked cigarettes to fill them with nicotine.

You left butterflies in my stomach,
so I guzzled *** to make them drown.

You left hope in my soul,
so I popped some pills to make it numb.

You left passion in my body,
so I expired my meals to make it disappear.

You left me with memories,
so I gave myself scars.