party

I do not want to sleep I want to get smashed

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

but I fall asleep it is Friday my youth
is waning. Please tell me every time
you want me there. I love to say I
will think about it. And I will. To
feel if the sun will warm the air
enough to drink gallons the death
of me. I want you to nail me
down I want to stay in bed I want to
surround myself with hanging lights
and loud whiskey-drinkers and dance
around smashed Bud Light bottles
gleaming with the force of recent
desire– someone leaving their
own temporal body, someone
leaving their wallet behind,
someone leaving the world
so damn lonely now.

(originally published in RASPUTIN, Winter 2020)

For Halloween I’ll be Jesus You Be Mary Magdalene

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

my cigarette-smoking badass waitress
      the Bible I’ll defenestrate at 3 A.M.

               Mary I went to Catholic school
while Josh played bagpipes at the Oval

Absorb tradition with sugary cocktails
               I didn’t say a word in the play

               as Pontius Pilate    I wouldn’t
               have contributed

Watch men get crucified by wine
Watch women excise their seven demons

                            this party’s a tomb
                            of sacred skeletons

leave it to the wild dogs to feast
on the bottles of Jagermeister

            we drink blue glasses
            of Zombie in the corner

 

(originally published in Down in the Dirt, Winter 2020)

I’ve Been on a Bender Since Becoming an Adult

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

in the dark of grimy
bars floral couches live

feathers (what a thrill beneath
neon green) in view of Saint

Maria’s grand brick parish
I unclasp Catholicism’s hands

from my neck (backdrop always holy
human touch) how can one believe

in anything other than getting fucked
up loving people at parties

unconditionally my friends I have
forgotten too many nights not

to complete the circle offered
under guidance of compass

and an unsteady hand
flicking the lighter

(originally published in Incessant Pipe, Winter 2021)

Death, 2009 (College)

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Flowers & God–
you tell me, slipshod,
there’s an afterlife
in the party we’re cheersing
to tonight our whole life
with small glasses of Granddad’s,
noisemakers, & drinking
games. I’d like to drown
the tissues
in something, listen to Gaelic
music like Dad used to
driving us from school with Pizza Hut
wafting from the trunk those
sunny afternoons. & now that you’ve
lost someone you’re willing to lose
your Bill Hicks-views-sense-
of-self-meaning like we all
funnel ethereal spirit into sky
& swig the rain with
drunken angels I know
you know you’re better than that.
I know you know once
the last attendee’s passed out
on the couch heavy breathing
lips purple you’d check
on him, too. You’d be alone
in the house you grew up in
with phone in your hand
calm and through the static of 911
racing to get the address out
the foaming of your mouth
and when a cop comes you
beg please don’t break this party up
and deny the red flashing lights
come

 

(originally published in 8 Poems, Summer 2018)

Pool Party

/ James Croal Jackson / Leave a comment

Yesterday we were at a pool party
attended by only a few others. It was
dog-friendly, as it was last week,
so the lone, small white dog
lapped water into his mouth
while on an inflatable raft and we
stood in silence and watched as he
drank the blue that held the specks
of fallen leaves and submerged spiders
while our beers turned warm. Last week
we were at a party in the same house
with a few of the same people but the
sun was out and I did not have to keep
wondering if you were okay, if you would
dip your feet into the clear with me and all
the people we did not know then because,
last week, a stranger in a bar did not yet
shake your body and bite you
long after you begged him not to–
no, the night before last week’s party
we danced to nineties hip-hop
inside the shadows of others until
we could not help but mine our
bodies for gold. Last week, we laughed
as the dog lapped the pool into his mouth
but watching, now, we know there are some
who force a tongue at whatever water
they see fit, how they lap and lap
until there’s nothing but a splash
of what they lapped at all.

 

(originally published in The Collapsar, Summer 2016)