we are sitting closer
to the television in a brand
new bedroom not
that we bought a new
house rather rearranged
everything the television
Playstation mini
tables dustballs morals
we never labeled
outside obvious
corners the air
conditioning vents in the faraway
summer I hope never
comes yes I am this
amount jaded the new colorful
reflections of the TV
beside its fresh horizon
almost like the screen’s
outside where I can finally live
my real life in pixelated terms
I know I know I am
conflicted about even
the architectural oxygen the wood
was inspected man just not
by me I mean girders in the semi
shallow underground been
scrubbing raw potato skins
only still to grok the boiled
intentions steaming the
mind’s kitchen I don’t got
knives I don’t got any
memory of the chicken
carrot stew just I often
feel infinitesimal I can’t
stop filling overfilling
the pot hot water simply
abundance very thankful
for plastic bags stuffed
in the cold seam of the
world our window
won’t open
(originally published in datura, Summer 2021)
tv
Rugby
on television are beefy men
staring each other down
the camera zooms on one he
blows his snot onto the green
grass a quiet meteor my friends
and I see that half-drunk at
the tavern then proceed to
agree we are too anxious
to blow our nose with one
thousand people watching
I guess it’s just testosterone,
man, the comparisons of
muscles and tendons without
the tenderness of inward
reflection, a pool rippling
out from the inside then
pouring out over the field
(originally published in Impspired, Spring 2020)
Unlike Reality
television
the mechanism
wherein brains
dwindle
upon a string
tethered
to satellite
voices
in my ears
and yours
a stranger
intimately
confined
to believe
one of us
is real
(originally published in DASH Literary Journal, Spring 2020)
Hive
I rented an apartment of bees
that first year in Los Angeles
sticky buzzing day and night
stingers past the turn of knob
sunny day the bees hovering
over body encircling you
paranoid optimistic dreamer
don’t leave the hive yes stay
get stung camera rolling and
action as in stasis as in days
wrapped around you burning
August blankets dripping lust
for fame everyone plays the
game gathering in droves to
hot stove hands on surface
level interaction as in in-
action
(originally published in Chronogram, Fall 2019)
Same as It Ever Was
I am reliving and reliving the remote
control buttons then buttons
in your bed, golden room of silk
and how many times did we drink
like that? Dropping beer after beer
at Zeno’s then groaning summer sleep
right after. What were we dreaming
about? The cat was snoring and
what an endless loop! Blinking
awake and wanting to crush
night back with aluminum eyelids
(originally published in The Drunken Llama, Summer 2021)
Let’s Make a Deal
At a McDonald’s in Ohio the TV
plays Let’s Make a Deal & two
old white men are enraptured mouths
open in awe of the studio energy
around Wayne Brady & I
know he’s happy but the audience
is fake I was paid to be
fake in L.A. forty dollars cash is all
it takes for one to clap clap
mid-clap three hours palms
burn & lucky luck even those
who somehow chosen sneak
onto stage know they did
not bring the green glittering
top hat they’re told to wear & now
their hair holds dead rabbits
the producers keep killing
& we’re laughing it’s funny
they tell us & when I was on
the show they asked me to whoop
my gutted-fish stomach out
& of course I yelled the wrong
numbers in the game & brand-
new sedans were revealed
as what I could have had
had I said six instead of
seven & then collected my
forty in line alongside everyone
returning loopy props to
props I know my mom is proud she
shows me & my colorful howling
crowd to happy rooms years
after the date I’m biting into
McNuggets with gold teeth
& cavities
(originally published in New Pop Lit, Spring 2018)
Kentucky Murder Mystery
no blood
where they found
my uncle
on the kitchen floor
hole in his heart
gun on steel barstool
on the drive to the wake
my aunt admits
she suspects
the eldest son
when I meet him
the first thing he says is
someone stole my idea
when I wrote Dexter in the 90s
I always wanted to write
about serial killers
when searching the room
no foam erupts from
volcanoes of old couches
no fingerprints to find
his suicide does not add up
my aunt says again and again
examining scrubbed floors
for heavy footsteps to appear
when nothing else will
(originally published in #theslideshow, Winter 2018)
Background Actors
At the foot of the staircase to the stars–
in the back of the line of actors drunken
from delusion (I’m going to make it),
each of us with hands full of hangers,
heads full of the fame
that glimpses a star, a familiar face,
how we chosen ones flicker
on living room screens
of friends and families–
a blip, a blur so brief
we were almost never there at all.
(originally published in The Piedmont Journal of Poetry and Fiction, Winter 2017)
Sunny Days
In memory of Chris Hull
friends don’t
wait for rainy days
to die
there is never
a metaphor
in the weather
the sun laughs
as it always does
when I receive the call
I find the nearest tree
to brace myself
with shade
it’s the only darkness
seventy-six degrees
warm breeze
the car
approaching the hospital
still takes her living
to work
at being alive
(originally published in Muddy River Poetry Review, Spring 2017)
Happy Hour Whiskey
I don’t think my dad would be proud of me
writing poems on bar napkins
after that fifth happy hour whiskey.
This is how I want it: to be disengaged
by the time my uniform cuffs roll
to my eyes in stupor to avoid the
solemn eyes of ancestors in the sky.
Transparent Mufasas and steely voices
judge me like America judges Kardashians.
The reality is you can rewind the DV tape
back to the beginning tomorrow and show me
the footage of my stumbling into the driver’s seat.
The cosmos roll in their graves.
Meanwhile I am the last child
who can cast the line onward–
past, present, future.
A syzygy from birth.
The headlights wane.
(originally published in Jawline Review, Spring 2016)