in the game you say it is time
to stop being obnoxious it is
morning in the year of Our
Tiger twenty twenty-two
feels like a glitch to write
over and over but living
like this with imposed
time limits before ice
scrapes off my vehicle
I lose sight of the sun
the windshield white
(originally published in Rundelania, Fall 2024)
Poetry
Falling Rock
As soon as a stone (from where,
who knows?) cracked my wind-
shield during a delivery I quit
my job as a driver. I zagged
right from the highway’s
middle lane to the median
and set the car in park,
but could not control my thoughts–
chest throbbing, engine thrumming.
I had to step out and breathe
before I could convict the
quartz intending to harm me.
All smooth and small, I was not
sure which was the right rock,
scanning gravel to see several
similar enough. But the wolf
among them, I know, wanted to
break the glass, blind me
and puncture my jugular, only
for me to be saved by a surgeon
who would never fully believe
the story. I avoided death this time,
alive on the side of the road, looking
back in search of a falling rock sign.
(originally published in Bond Street Review, Winter 2021)
The Well
bucket
hangs
on
frayed
rope
the old
man
could
not
recall
how to
drop
arms
moving
straight
down
how deep
how
fragile
the mind
is now
and how
fast
it falls
as soon
as
control
slips
away
bits
of wood
in
dark
water
echo
a
hollow
splash
(originally published in Willow Review, Spring 2025)
I Never Considered My Grandparents
Whom I never met, would be buried in Akron,
the backdrop of sleepless drunk nights, wandering
park properties as if I owned them in my boisterous
consumption, alive but for the thrill of spending
time with those I wish eternity upon, gathered
before me the gargoyles, the hellraisers, the love
I could burrow underneath rain-pocked heartache,
one golden anniversary away from immortality
on a slab of stone drunk kids can stumble over
and plant their knees in the recycled mud.
(originally published in Impspired, Summer 2023)
Bro
Get out of my life with
your election signs. Don’t
tell me what stakes
you stuck in your front lawn.
Come on. I know you’re not
a boomer. You say we’re at
a crossroads and I gaze
into the neighbor’s yard–
used to be bushes concealing
every outside path. Now there’s
someone on a lawnmower severing
the bonds of grass, in intervals,
each direction I look, each time
I visit home. And we comment
each new motor makes it harder
to reach each other. Mom’s
neighbors want to beat the rain.
We just built this fire in the back
of my childhood home. These
bundles of sticks my mom gathers,
waiting for us to come home
some early October Saturday.
At my brother’s first mention
of herd immunity, my sister
suggests we seek more kindling
in the tall grass. The air is
parched but we must keep
burning. Firewood left from Dad’s
death we’ve already forgotten.
My brother says we’re gonna
lose all this country fought for–
Dad survived World War II
only to shatter his ribs on a fire
hydrant sixty years later. Mom
would not let the coroner dig
into his carcass for an autopsy.
In his later years, Dad would keep
a hose beside our bonfires. Still,
we hunch over heat together,
burning hot dogs on forgotten
skewers. We dredge the past
again: a year after my father’s death,
cooking hot dogs over walnut husks,
one of you said there could be
an industry for the timbered taste
coating the tenuous meat we’ve
shared over the years.
(originally published in Alternate Route, Spring 2023)
Sensory Deprivation Tank
At first was suffocating.
In my throat was a sandbag.
After I practiced pushing the door
to escape, once I learned how to remove tension–
both arms hot dog-style past my head–
I became a floating head in a dead, still ocean.
Breathing itself was a plane running the runway–
the only sound in the universe.
(originally published in Brief Wilderness, Winter 2024)
It’s Complicated
Sure, I know the DJ at Belvedere’s tonight
but that is all I have. My body is an ocean
liner that imagined a destination when
departing, but lost its way mid-voyage
while passengers scream it’s okay!
It’s okay!
On simple days
I open the window and watch
clouds pass with my long-hair
cat, breathing in the breeze like
we’ve both never been outside
before, trying to find some
comfortable place to rest
with the rail jutting up,
a dull blade.
(originally published in Ink Sac, Summer 2023)
The View at Work: Dump Trucks
Look at this kingdom of garbage
trucks. A survey underneath
the 31st St. Bridge, where I spend
my horrible days collecting.
It is Friday night and there is
pressure to deliver. I told you
nothing we do here is important,
so take a deep breath. Smell
the compost of contemporary
capitalism. My blue brain
has ceased to need a function.
My winter is every man’s
desire for himself. It is waiting
for my back to give and bear
the weight of the waste:
the compacted nature of my life,
squandering, squandering,
squandering the ineffable.
(originally published in A God You Believed In - Pinhole Poetry, 2023)
Strangers with Appreciation
IN BOUNDLESS EXPANSE
BETWEEN JOB AND SILENCE
NOSTALGIA AND THE EVER-
LIVING PRESENT I SIT IN FRONT
OF A PROJECTOR SCREEN
COOLED BY THE WINDOW
UNIT I CAN DERIVE NO
MORE MEANING TO VIDEO
GAMES NO
it is the purpose of a stranger to dream
for me to be engaged so in his fever
your creativity is what I want
now that I don’t have the rapturous
privilege of losing myself
but haven’t I
wrestled with every single
whim every whistle
of the wind that calls for me
I answer
for a little while then reach then
ASK NO QUESTIONS
FOR ANSWERS I COULD NEVER KNOW
THE MEANING OF THE STARS NOR
MY PLACE WITHIN MY BRAIN WHERE
THE SOUL SITS
it’s sick sometimes in
how I want to be someone else???
but I look at old pictures of myself
and think he’d be so happy to see
how unrecognizable he is to himself
(originally published in confetti, Fall 2023)
Promise of Morning
broken wind through bent window
tonight estimates life long enough
to breathe sunlight
(originally published in Winamop, Winter 2023)