"overpass" poems
The weak breeze whispers nothing
The water screams sublime
His feet shift, teeter-totter
Deep breath, stand back, it’s time
Toes untouch the overpass
Soon he’s water bound
Eyes locked shut but peek to see
The view from halfway down
A little wind, a summer sun
A river rich and regal
A flood of fond endorphins
Brings a calm that knows no equal
You’re flying now
You see things much more clear than from the ground
It’s all okay, it would be
Were you not now halfway down
Thrash to break from gravity
What now could slow the drop
All I’d give for toes to touch
The safety back at top
But this is it, the deed is done
Silence drowns the sound
Before I leaped I should’ve seen
The view from halfway down
I really should’ve thought about
The view from halfway down
I wish I could’ve known about
The view from halfway down
Feb 11, 2020
Feb 11, 2020 at 9:53 AM UTC
I don't know what I'm doing
I don't know what I'm feeling
I don't know where I'm going
I don't know who I'm being
I'm overwhelmed,
frustrated,
I can't cope
These are the slogans
I repeat to myself
Over and over again
Oh yeah
I'm a failure too
I've lived this life
What did I do?
What do I have to
show for it?
These facts about myself
are the one thing
I'm very positive about.
I repeat these slogans
day in and day out
always wondering
what I'm so
depressed about
I bury my head in these sands
Suffocating
Smothering
choking on anxiety
in my own
advertising slogans
on my private airwaves
To complicate
matters
worse
just because we think something
doesn't make it true
that goes for
self worth too.
But
Mindfulness
stands
watching the passing cars
from a freeway overpass
like our racing thoughts
not holding on
not making them go away,
in peace
simply
letting them
be.
Apr 21, 2016
Apr 21, 2016 at 1:22 PM UTC
probly a few minutes
and i was done
writing wasn't feeling the same
i stood on top like
bricks around disaster
i was looking up
i took my shoes off
threw them aside still laced
i wasn't being funny
i know where this is going
where i write
where i see cracks in perfect paths
where blood taste like metals of purity
with every year burning
where these flowers like to live
die on vines from inside
allowing ivy to climb my back
i am a length of fence
in a yard with no dog
on a gate without reason
sitting on a post during live events
i am a fool for giving into seasons
romancing everything like a poet
following every inch of broken glass
nodding to my friends that i'm willing to mend
but waiting for them to laugh
outlined with chalk on the sidewalk
where blood stains concrete my convictions
flowing from the curb to the overpass
in the night like candles floating water
under tree branches ready to crack
formatting clouds to sky write, come with me
a man in the park on his back
Nov 1, 2016
Nov 1, 2016 at 5:24 AM UTC
The calender reads 2016
But its feels more like 1984
Have you heard the crying
The American dream
Lying dying in the streets
While big brother
Is strapping blinders
On our heads
And shackles to
Our hands and feet
Were being lined up
By the rows
Willing prisoners
Of the slave power
Empire of minimum wage
Shuttling our children
Off to the animal farm
Market of big business
And big lies
***** water mixed
In with the rotting
Apples of the
New American pie
The sugar isn't sweet
To the starving
In the street
While trash cans
Over flow in the back lots
Of the super market
Super chains
Of the slave power
Empire of criminal rage
And its the cold dark waters
Of nuclear waste
Soaking the pages of the calender
That reads
2016
In these days that feel like
1984
No kindness or compassion
For hands shaking tin cups
Needing just a little change
Just a little shelter
From their sad weather lifes
Living on the cold ground
Below our overpass ways
No shelter and no change
No compassion and no kindness
In the fist and pockets
Of the slave power
Empire of ignorant ways
Bullets, bombs and hate
Harvesting fresh blood
For the ink
To print the pages of the calender
That reads
2016
As politicians write us back
Into the pages of the days of
1984
May 23, 2016
May 23, 2016 at 4:27 PM UTC
Abigail slides the glass door shut.
As beads of water percolate off her body
and land on the faux stone tile,
the smell of chlorine from her swim
and the smell of coffee from my brewing *** blend.
My uncle, Abigail's father, and my mother
are seated at the sticky, spilt soda kitchen table beside me.
"Go get ready for dinner," my mother's brother says, sending
Abigail's bikini'd frame through doorway and around the bend.
The brew idles, and I'm all porcelain and sugar substitute for a moment,
then back by my uncle and mother.
"Abigail has gotten so thin," my mother says.
"Is she eating?" my mother asks.
"I know it's tough for girls her age. When they're looking to marry," my mother says.
I want to bash the smoking cup into her face.
My uncle says she's been training for a marathon.
My neurons get tidy and taper off.
So, it's out of the kitchen and into an empty living room
to park my *** on an empty piano bench.
I set the coffee on top, and press eight of my fingers down
on black keys.
I hear toes-to-heels, toes-to-heels.
I gaze over my shoulder.
Now, Abigail's in a black, black dress. Mid-thigh.
In her left hand,
red fuck-me-shoes with a heel that could turn a curious man blind;
in her right hand,
black pantyhose and cherry lipgloss.
"You should have swam," Abigail delivers with hushed precision,
like she'd been reciting the line throughout the duration of her swim.
Abigail has long brunette hair,
and it's sticking to her neck.
Deep permanent dimples frame her lips.
She's a nurse in Waco.
Each time I see her, I think about
Bukowski's 103-pound "Texan".
It makes me rash, violent, a heady monstrosity,
and trembling sick.
"I forgot my trunks."
"That's no excuse."
I would respond, but she's sliding the hose up her leg.
In the living room.
While my uncle talks a second mortgage around the bend.
Her right leg crosses her left,
an overpass and an interstate.
My forehead overheats in a flash,
and I feel like she's staring back at me.
When my leering eyes shift from
her toes to her eyes, the pupils beckon:
"All roads lead to me."
Jun 18, 2012
Jun 18, 2012 at 12:48 AM UTC
Incessent drumming and the roar of raindrops
Keep me from sleeping past dawn
Welly boots step into the cold, wet day
as the sky weeps for the loss of summer.
The wind takes the wheel,
driving water up trouser legs, into socks, under hats
Blown out beş lira umbrellas discarded on the overpass
A graveyard of useless metal spiders.
Still,
Still it rains
Impromptu lakes form from the spontaneous rivers flowing in every street
Bosphorus babies, cleansing the heart of the city
People look like street cats;
Soaked, preening, cowering under any shelter they can find
And still, Istanbul.
Still she rains.
Oct 29, 2010
Oct 29, 2010 at 1:33 AM UTC
Did you know that if you leave your car in your driveway,
With the keys in the ignition,
And someone sits down in the front seat like they own it, and drives away,
You are the one who is liable for theft?
They can drive that sucker to the coast.
They can burn the upholstery with their cigarettes. They can bring their friends into the back seat, and fill the compartments with their refuse, and **** and they can leave it ruined in front of your house, or crushed into the median on the highway, or left in disconnected pieces under an overpass.
It will be called, “unauthorized use of a vehicle.”
It will be called a “misdemeanor.”
But you left the car running.
Weren't you kind of asking for it to happen?
They said,
This,
(Gesturing to the skirt which fell to two inches
above my kneecap),
Is like that.
If I walk outside of my house in jeans and a t-shirt, or a long dress with thin straps,
Or with my chin tilted out,
Or with long eyelashes,
Or with full lips,
Or with my hips swaying when I walk,
It's like I left the car running.
It's like I invited them to force their bodies into the front seat.
In their minds, or with their hands, or with their lips to anyone who would listen to them.
Little girls in leotards become like unlocked car doors;
Where men can burn their cigarettes into their skin,
Or stick their fingers in
In plain view of their parents,
And told to let it happen,
Quietly.
It isn't theft,
It's “a medical examination.”
What did they expect?
It isn't a theft.
She was just as guilty of negligence.
It isn't really a felony.
It's not THAT BAD. (Stop being so dramatic.)
It's the unauthorized use of your body, for a time, or one night,
or every time you close your eyes for the rest of your life,
Sure-
But you left the car running.
May 22, 2018
May 22, 2018 at 1:25 PM UTC
It's the first day of summer heat.
Temperature is one hundred and four.
The junkies and drunks hit the street,
shufflin' towards death's door.
Freon raindrops fall from air conditioners
that hang from windows on the third floor.
I think "this day couldn't be finer",
as I shuffle towards death's door.
Bicycle tires roll over broken glass
from the shattered window of a store.
The prostitutes all congregate beneath the overpass,
as they shuffle towards death's door.
**** smoke fills the air
as I finish off beer number four.
A chance to put my mind elsewhere,
as I shuffle towards death's door.
Sep 18, 2014
Sep 18, 2014 at 9:20 PM UTC
Notice how he has numbered the blue veins
in my breast. Moreover there are ten freckles.
Now he goes left. Now he goes right.
He is buiding a city, a city of flesh.
He's an industrialist. He has starved in cellars
and, ladies and gentlemen, he's been broken by iron,
by the blood, by the metal, by the triumphant
iron of his mother's death. But he begins again.
Now he constructs me. He is consumed by the city.
>From the glory of words he has built me up.
>From the wonder of concrete he has molded me.
He has given me six hundred street signs.
The time I was dancing he built a museum.
He built ten blocks when I moved on the bed.
He constructed an overpass when I left.
I gave him flowers and he built an airport.
For traffic lights he handed at red and green
lollipops. Yet in my heart I am go children slow.
3.3k
Look at us, I'm carrying a basket made of trash
and you're carrying a mouse, well
the dog chewed up your glasses
but you're still rockin it
you have a single drop of coffee on your nose,
we're ready to go to D.C.
I had another where-are-we moment, it was fun.
Good, that's downtown Baltimore right there,
****** capital of the world.
An elaborate mural graffiti.
Wall after brick wall.
A rustbelt city like Grand Rapids
Detroit Cincinnati.
Did you sleep well?
Yes I woke up feeling like a clam in a cocoon.
A sea creature inside of a forest insect, okay.
I've wasted too much time on both desire and regret.
Yellow bridge.
Blue-green supports.
Singer on the radio saying, we're young right now.
There's a healthy and an unhealthy way of dealing with pain,
I'm sorry for my selfish behavior in the islands.
I want to go back and leave a better legacy.
'Word.'
Last night to come see you I drove I-95 N, the overpass
and though the rest of the city was really moving
I was all alone up there, it was like
driving in the sky.
We pass signs saying: Icy Conditions:
bridges and ramps freeze first.
And a billboard: Learning Kick Flips
Takes Work, So Does College
We listen to our favorite island song:
love the islands, love the islands, oh.
You look like a rasta snowboarder girl
There's something really right
about having you in this car
Mar 26, 2013
Mar 26, 2013 at 1:31 PM UTC
Ghost Relics
Downtown,
where Main intersects Main
you'll see the last living tissue
of a breathing bazaar.
They weighed down her chest with bricks and girders.
It's a wonder she breathes at all.
-
Wander too far in any direction
and you're sure to see the husks
of once proud and bustling businesses.
Abandoned sanctums of mortar and majesty.
Scars of the Midwest etched as constants in our mind.
Dusty and silent since the cradle.
-
The theaters are bedeviled with dolled up haunts
who just wandered over from Greenwood to catch the matinee.
Management still leaves the lights on for kicks after hours
to throw off their sleep schedules while they wait for the feature to start.
Up all night, sleep all day; they read by neon and slumber under Sol.
Here I am, left lounging in The Devil's Chair. Crickets keep quavering.
-
Underneath the Franklin Street overpass sleeps a family bound by naught.
They watch in dawn's light as the few pedestrian that traverse Cerro Gordo
advert their eyes as some sort of silent symbol of respect for their situation.
It's as if the very stare of a privileged man could drain 'til depleted.
They never ask for anything, they just wade it out and listen to
the cars overhead, the train-clock's trumpet, and the heartbeats in between.
-
Leaks are patched, potholes filled, and yet
we're still loosing blood; becoming beguiled.
So many stray cats in the civilian savanna,
aimlessly seeking names and second chances.
"This premises is under police video surveillance" -
hanging like ornaments from streetlamp poles.
-
Guarding the gates
of a dwindling dominion,
as the armies of Union and Grand
wait in their camps
for the rust to take hold
of her iron veins.
Jun 14, 2014
Jun 14, 2014 at 12:52 AM UTC
caveat! —bursting out as the fuse fetters away
wafting t'ward oil spills, tranquilized guns
with pace maker minds
and time to ****
sickle celled, graving shores
plead to crawl underground
through cascading bile and sedatives
that sift through these negatives
like bangled thieves
who crawl on broken knees
and lie idle under haunted bridges.
bouldered bones intertwine
or veins cut along a dotted line
caveat! cries the sayer's sooth,
for he says it scours and devours—
the slinking nightmare sleuth.
the tar is interrupted in carved equinoxes
soak in the crippled toxins
as the air becomes as thick as theophany
and tharm like grease in blood that take me in,
through ash and mud and
all the spider webs caving in
like delicate gorges forges beneath
nightmare sleuth reaching zenith
caveat, silhouettes
stretched out like oil in water
and this silicon tomb can hold me no longer
for i must break out before i am a goner
because it's a mistake that i'll never shake
your face turns opaque
and there was nothing in your eyes
but dripping flesh
wring out all your words for me
your jeers and your juries
but go cling to your crutch
your kings and your qualms
and the church that burns
in its hallow vacancy
for none can resist the urge
that thieves its delinquents from catatonic catacombs
and quagmire junctions
where the swamp will **** you in
and festering sweat sticks like guilt to your skin
and hell is a nightclub where every loss is a life
and heaven's a daydream with your neck to the knife
it needs no rhyme or reason
and every slip of your broken lip
just lose your grip and give in to the treason
would you rather burn at the stake
than suffer your cement heart break
with no reason or rhyme
it's just the weight of the season
backdrop collapse
railroads unfolding
and like a cell storm the train
is coming your way
and slinks away like a nightmare sleuth
it just takes one swipe of the claw
or one bite of the tooth
and it drags you in
feel the sidewalk sleeping
and the blinking lights creeping
above the overpass
and the cold wind reeling--
it'll be your last.
Nov 18, 2012
Nov 18, 2012 at 6:36 PM UTC
Kind,
Shy, funny man,
Did the best that he can,
To raise me to be what I am,
Beautiful baby girl,
Smiling every second,
What everyone wants in the world
Years pass,
Daddy always there,
Doing the best he can,
Raising me to be the way I am
Beautiful baby girl,
A baby no more,
Middle school,
Troubled;
Diminished smile,
Daddy where are you?
No reply
Daddy's soul has left his eyes
No more doing what he can to raise me how I am,
Doing what he can,
To stop the voices in his head
Searching for cameras,
In the walls,
Paranoia controls his all,
Delusions
President,
Police,
Mom,
Everyone out to get him,
Stumbling upon his daughters sketchbook,
Sketch unfinished;
Headless body
Voices,
Convincing to be dismembered,
Out to get him;
Dismember him,
Paranoia growing,
Irritability as well,
Mommy a victim,
Strangled, breathless,
By a body with no soul
Life flashes amongst her eyes,
Children being married,
Awakes,
Escapes,
Daddy's alone,
In a mental home
Not for long,
Returns with medicine to fix the harm
Daddy?
Void of soul replaced
Stability,
Daddy regained,
Medicine disposed,
Voices grow,
They're going to **** me,
The 9th,
Facing doom,
Departure to a highway overpass,
Aimlessly walking,
The edge
Concerned bystandards,
Authorities called,
Shouting,
Scared,
No way out,
A fall,
A crash,
Daddy,
Is dead.
Dec 17, 2014
Dec 17, 2014 at 4:11 AM UTC
The ruler comes down from on high
Dragging himself along the earth
Insulation going up like confetti
Take cover, take shelter
Ice the size of softballs
Comes streaking from the sky
There’s nowhere left to run
Huddled under the bridge
And then a sound like rushing water
Feels like a freight train overhead
We weep and cry and gnash our teeth
As the trumpet blares
Drove down Telephone Road
Where it crosses the highway
Sandcastles washed out to sea
Old bills put through the shredder
Nov 2, 2013
Nov 2, 2013 at 12:50 AM UTC
Under harsh street lights
And a rusted skeletal overpass
We walked in the syrupy
Silence of a Sunnyside Saturday
Night
A man asked me in accented
English
"Want that burrito spicy?"
"Yes"
His eyebrows go up
"Spicy?"
"Yes, ******* spicy!"
He smiles to himself
Reaches back into the food truck
And pours sauces and
Liquids of varying color
And viscosity into the
Tortilla
Wraps it up for me
Gives me my change
And waves me off with a smile
When we get back to the apartment
She is mad
Because I choose to make love to the
Burrito instead of her
I can't help it
Drunk eating is one of the
Forbidden joys of life
She slams the door and
Shuffles around yelling
By the time I'm done the burrito
She is telling me to sleep on the couch
Which is fine because I can't
Feel my mouth anyway
The burrito is so **** spicy
I tell her this and that her
Kisses would be wasted
If she wants to waste her time
With me, I want to feel it
We sleep together for
The night
Sep 26, 2016
Sep 26, 2016 at 6:15 PM UTC
Aliens
They have no notion of past or present,
everything is about oceans.
When they ask for you
it is really a story about seeing the ocean.
VISITOR #1:
Listen. It is failure of bridges that builds angels.
GROCERY BAGGER/ COLLEGE STUDENT:
Is this the depression
we've all been experiencing?
VISITOR #4:
Please have a seat and forget the edge of that coast,
you were not intended for this distance.
GROCERY BAGGER/ COLLEGE STUDENT:
I believe we're all owed an explanation.
Where is this manifest?
I've never ridden a horse, I am being dreamed about.
VISITOR #1:
You would not believe
the stories redwoods have.
You each get one phone call.
GROCERY BAGGER/ COLLEGE STUDENT:
But the voicemail I've been trying to reach,
all morning,
is full.
"I dream of psychiatrists telling stories
about dreaming of women
they've seen in unedited videos on the internet.
Sometimes they save her from that burning nightclub."
VISITOR #2:
If you're going, leave your voice
somewhere in a room I know.
COLLEGE STUDENT:
We would have no need for phones if you didn't invent distance.
VISITOR #2:
There are trees that become stained with a purple blossom.
During summer the blossoms fall and shadow around the trunk
like a violet negative.
What a beautiful dimension that must be.
They pull her skirt down to examine the body,
palms pour from a sidewalk in L.A.,
everything is cracked-
"My god she's beautiful, huh?"
I think I met them before,
a long time ago.
THE MEMORY OF A VISITOR APPEARING IN A DREAM:
What happens next? Come the exit of electricity from the body;
on a long enough time-line all weather radicalizes and the people
will grow into trees.
You can read about that hollowness and never be prepared for it.
It’s like standing on the edge of an overpass,
and being completely empty of the urge to jump.
This is what I remember:
instructed to reenact creation
she throws clothes
from an open window above the 60 freeway.
"You have to imagine there are people,
surrounding you and talking"
Apr 28, 2016
Apr 28, 2016 at 10:29 AM UTC
The rattling
of an empty plastic water bottle
on a trash-ridden street
at 3 a.m.
is so exceedingly hopeless
that it makes me want to
jump.
Seeing the two drops of water
lingering in the bottom
causes me to untie
my beat-up shoes,
take off
my plain grey socks,
and place them in a neat
and hopeless
pile
next to the overpass.
The label
peeling away from the bottle
forces me to climb over the railing
onto the little ledge,
high above the busy street
below.
Glancing at the forlorn
plastic water bottle,
I prepare to jump.
A ****** homeless man
shuffles down the ***** street
picks up the bottle
and puts it in his bag.
“'scuse me miss,
do ya have any spare change?”
I stare at him with dead eyes
and begrudgingly climb down
from the railing.
Nov 25, 2013
Nov 25, 2013 at 5:25 PM UTC
Flag of my fathers
When will the winds of equality
lift you from your languid prison?
When will your 12,000,000
illegals be given shelter
beneath your furled stars?
Flag of my fathers
When will you be worthy
of your returning veterans?
I'm tired of them washing
my windows for spare change
beneath the overpass
Flag of my fathers
When will your gays and lesbians
be more than fodder for bible
thumping patriots?
I was a bible thumping patriot
once but I never hated the gays
I'm tired and broke Flag of my fathers
The bank wants my house
and the Chinaman wants my job
He's welcome to it if he can get
the Indian to give it up
The doctor wants my money
but it's all been squandered
on promises and broken dreams
I call for equality Flag of my fathers
and they call me a communist
I'm not a communist but if communists
believe in equality, was Jefferson
a communist?
Flag of my fathers
They tell me to leave if I don't like
the way things are but where will I go?
Mexico's crowded and Canada's cold
The government tells me 'get a job'
but the corporation says 'get an education'
The University hands me a bill
and when I can't pay
they tell me 'get a job'
It's all ****** up Flag of my fathers
It doesn't make any sense
I've got a headache, leave me
alone
I'm so tired
Watching shadows crawl across
the wall is dull even for a slow
witted fool like me
Flag of my fathers
Why are we at war?
Why are we closing our museums
and demolishing our libraries?
Why are we feeding our military
and starving our vets?
It's too much to take
Flag of my fathers
It's too **** much to take...
Apr 7, 2013
Apr 7, 2013 at 10:56 AM UTC
Flag of my fathers
When will the winds of equality
lift you from your languid prison?
When will your 12,000,000
immigrants get a fair shake
beneath your furled stars?
Flag of my fathers
When will you be worthy
of your returning veterans?
I'm tired of them washing
my windows for spare change
beneath the overpass
Flag of my fathers
When will your gays and lesbians
be more than fodder for bible
thumping patriots?
I was a bible thumping patriot
once but I never hated the gays
I'm tired and broke Flag of my fathers
The bank wants my house
and the Chinaman wants my job
He's welcome to it if he can get
the Indian to give it up
The doctor wants my money
but it's all been squandered
on promises and broken dreams
I call for equality Flag of my fathers
and they call me a communist
I'm not a communist but if communists
believe in equality, was Jefferson
a communist?
Flag of my fathers
They tell me to leave if I don't like
the way things are but where will I go?
Mexico's crowded and Canada's cold
The righties tell me 'get a job'
but the jobies say 'get an education'
The Universities hand me a bill
and when I can't pay
they tell me 'get a job'
It's all ****** up Flag of my fathers
and doesn't make any sense
I've got a headache, leave me
alone
I'm so tired
Watching shadows crawl across
the walls is dull even for a slow
witted fool like me
Flag of my fathers
Why are we at war?
Why are we closing our museums
and demolishing our libraries?
Why are we feeding our military
and starving our vets?
It's too much to take
Flag of my fathers
It's too **** much to take...
Jan 23, 2013
Jan 23, 2013 at 10:53 AM UTC
Ever seen the inside of a Teletubbie's belly?
I did
that **** gave me cataracts and glaucoma
which lead to injesting large amounts of guacamole
got huge
mostly in the head-
found a homeless man, let him sleep on my couch
he liked to tell stories about his encounters with celebrities
oh which he was one
back in the day, I think he was on Rosanne
never watched it but he was cool enough
we biked to the overpass to drop waterballoons on those who needed them most
like fake-tanned blondes in convertibles
and bicyclers.
I love all kinds of people and can forgive their beligerence
though mine are quite strange
I like canoing in trees and making mosaics from bone fragments and rubies
just a bit of a mind juggler
smacking singles on counters for pregnancy tests and breath mint
tell a tubby his belly is wide
and boy you'll be scoutin' a whole new skull.
Jun 2, 2012
Jun 2, 2012 at 11:31 PM UTC
He catches an upward blast and is cascaded toward the heavens
A plume of feathers both grey and blue
Soaring high above, riding the draft
Elegant and careless like the Valkyrie's flight
Sailing onward to certain victory!
The drums roll and the trumpets shout
Beating to the crest of the aerial knight
Streamlined magnificence fit for a king
A slave to no one -- A peasant to all
The overpass pigeon takes flight
Mar 19, 2012
Mar 19, 2012 at 2:52 AM UTC
At a time where it seems so very hard, for me just to feel alive.
all I wanted then, was to drive
As ridiculous as it seems
it was the stuff of my dreams
all I needed was my car and vacant 4am roads.
Going through the gears, as if they were my final years
piston tatted-ring finger; hand firmly wrapped around the wheel
braking late into the corner
locking up the alloy steel wheels on my automobile
the tires squeal
waltzing them back into rotation as I find the threshold
clutch in
twist of the leg at the hip, I blip the throttle with my heel
down into second
one swift movement
un-burnt fuel erupts in the pipes.
blitzing through the off ramp
keeping it tight, clipping the manhole cover in the apex
pedal flat coming out, bounce the tach' as its not worth the upshift
pitch the car into the long sweeping overpass bend
the back end kicks out on decel'
counter steer and slam the accelerator back into the bare metal floor
front wheels clawing in the direction that I please
keys slapping my knees
straighten out and I ease her back home.
reverse down into the narrow; dimly lit garage
as I climb out, I can feel the heat radiating from the machine I built
hot oil ticking as it finds its way back to the pan
I stand and watch my car slowly disappear behind the garage door
it is but another night survived
for both of us.
Sep 18, 2017
Sep 18, 2017 at 1:47 AM UTC
Now:
The EMTs respond.
A Jane Doe is found dead.
Beneath the I-90 overpass.
They lift her
Zip her into a bag,
And transport her to the morgue.
They can’t feel sad.
Today:
The few wispy strands of hair that remain
Dangle haphazardly from her scabby head
Jagged misshapen teeth protrude from dry cracked lips
betraying breath that stinks of infection and decomposition
Vermin gnaw on exposed flesh while parasites feast within.
Her eyes dim as her body putrifies.
Last Week:
Mission workers prop her up against the wobbly chain link fence
A thin blanket is wrapped around her bony shoulders and
Her blue-tarp awning is adjusted
She would be less wet and cold.
For a night.
They leave a cheese sandwich and chicken noodle soup.
The rats eat most of it.
She wouldn’t have kept it down anyway.
Last Month:
The shelter is scary and dangerous.
She couldn’t sleep without nightmares and her screaming disrupted other ‘guests’.
The shelter workers apologize and put her out at 2:19 AM.
She finds a spot between two dumpsters.
It reeks of **** but is unoccupied.
Sometime in the dark she is ***** and beaten by two crackheads.
The crime is unreported.
Last Year:
The fluorescent lights sting her eyes.
The antiseptic smell burns her nose.
The noise and chaos that surround her make her dizzy and disoriented.
She fights hard to get away but is restrained by strong hands – then leather straps.
A painful jab in her arm and then nothing.
Days or weeks later she emerges in a haze.
Kindly eyes greet her.
They stay with her.
They accompany her to the shelter.
They tell her to come back for follow-on care.
She never sees them again.
Before:
The divorce rips her heart in two.
She has nothing.
She is nothing.
Her world crumbles beneath her and she crumbles with it.
Where would she go?
What would she do?
Everything has become so wrong.
Once Upon a Time:
She was happy. Joyful.
Filled with life and hope.
He was smart, funny, successful.
Together they were magical.
Perfect.
May 9, 2017
May 9, 2017 at 3:21 PM UTC