Digging Through Bad Old Poetry Again

It sure is a bitch to format poems properly on blogger.

7 Ways to Feel Raped


I. Alcohol

you can’t die
from a bleeding ulcer
I’ll have another
amber hitter
calm the hurt down with
a beer chaser
until I begin
to undress before
your friends
and you bring me another
and I beg and cry
for another
don’t let it dry up
don’t let it spill out
just
one
more just
one more
just
omnoere
so I don’t feel
your sticky palm
on my thigh


II. Loneliness

there’s a bloated frog
on my chest
a needle in my left
pupil
cat scratches making highways
on my arms
the phone’s off the hook
the refrigerator won’t stop humming
Sylvia left the toaster oven on again
prozac
effexor
zoloft
xanax
put another pill on my tongue



III. Eyes

push in
harder, you’ve got to force it
don’t worry, I want it

they’re watching me
they whisper

peel back the rough skin
and scoop out the frog eggs
in handfuls

place them on my tongue
tart pink ecstasy

I swallow each solid
round center
to give you a peek

at my insides
as they bunch
and shred
and blacken


IV. Cigarettes

carton
21.99
something mid-grade
2.55
shit, why not camels
3.10
black phlegm
more cigs?
where are my pills?
15
I don’t have it
too bad
well, I’ve got 5
gimme a pack of Old Gold
and an iron lung


V. Words

tiger lily
alright
love love love
I think I hate you
I think I hate me
I think I could fall
and you might swim
I’ve never lied
it was all bed talk
tiger lily
my dancing peasant
the one with icicles
for eyelashes
I don’t tell lies
what would Sartre say?
what did I just say?
just breathe me in
tiger lily
I think I could love you, just
don’t
come
back


VI. Television

flip
cops arresting belligerent drunks
flip
golden monkeys eating ticks off each others bodies
flip
some Woody Allen film
flip
sex, violence, love ?
flip
St. John’s Wort-a miracle cure
flip
a butterfly feeds on a tiger lily
flip


VII. Poetry

it’s time to end the game
exposure grows old
pain seems weak
and melodramatic
I’m going to take my
pills and escape
these bubbling
theatrics