Mr. Saturday says, please, call me Mandatory

rising runnels of

scorched coffee smelling bullshit.

my Cuban heels besmirched on a 

Saturday morning at school.

 

the halls are forked with effluvia,

we erect battlements around

our shitty disciplinary tributaries

 

that meet briefly

to renounce the sin of throwing

grips of cash at

carpetbaggers

who arrange what they do into digestible units

who mistake  loving the Houston Astros for

foreplay

 they

tag team

brain fuck

us all by powerpoint,

 

from the comfort of their home offices.

 

they want our shoes back

but i guess If we have one weakness

its they just love too much

 

exciting new solutions

a cure  for test scores,

neck lines, and expectations.

 

the district is smitten.

my inbox is wet.

 

the real challenge here is

how to navigate

embarrassing public displays

of explicit personal/political animosity

from a disgruntled faculty

when you’ve got a piss stain on your khakis

confession of a shitty kid

I used to wish Ben Miracle was my dad.

He looked like a JC Penney ad, with a woman who died

and left him my friend Justin as a backstory.

he wouldn’t look at you but when he did

after a couple of beers (because we were young

he’d rather have

us drink with him)

when he did look you in the eye, you felt discovered

because he could barely believe that

a couple of middle school burnouts

was all he had to talk to

 

coming off the road to wash up

scrub down

and fuck off again,

my dad hogged the

wild flowers on our pink couch

and drilled me to catch him up

on General Hospital

 

at the perfume counter I told her it was a mix of old spice

cigarettes, sweat and cut grass,

hint of yeast,

twist off spritz from a freshly cracked Blatz,

a puff of gasoline and

catfish bait

that i was looking for

 

Larry got to know the neighborhood so good

before he was shot blind.

if ya’ll were drunk

you’d slide over and let him drive.

at a stop sign you'd tell him left,

but watch out for this one crossing the street, Larry,

you wouldn’t believe it. They don't look the same

as when you could see

 

you left your extra teeth in a glass on the sink.

Just for Men,

Alberto Vo5 hair oil. that’s one

area where you

spoiled yourself.

 

brother randy slipped me a bill

at the bus station in exchange for a

mercifully short conversation

about my drinking.

my last hundred

you took from me.

Ok, you won.

with a shit hand.

which I described to your little sister when

the lights burnt out

in her chandelier.

she sent me home with a box of Little Debbie's

and tried to pay me for the bulbs.

the sadness is a permanent fixture.

Aside the constant pain 

that 

is the thing she notices

most about getting old.

Icebreakers at Speed Dating Night Under the I-35 Bridge

I burglarized a van last night

it was unlocked.

I suppose it was asking for it, right

forgive me, his words, not mine,

but,

did you “fuck” her? 

yes, but I saved them

so much on car insurance

by leaving the window intact. 

a pair of mockingbirds dive on a

gray stray hauling 

substantial testicular heft,

one of their own in his mouth.

his, the unbroken stride of  

a former senator going in for a handshake

with BB King during the Clinton Administration.

outraged at this senseless routine

they bang their beaks on kitty’s rib cage

over and over again

I curse relative comfort

upon the cardboard that protects my skin but sucks for fucking.

survey the land underneath the bridge

offer my wrists 

to the patrolman in exchange for help locating his mind.

he declines and proposes,

without walls,

I don’t exist

So. order of business #1 

since time is either what I’m doing wrong 

or not doing enough of, I propose 

Gods,

judge me not as a God.

who could even pass this test:

Stand up if you’ve never touched an uncircumsized penis. 

Stay seated if not. If so, 

Turn 7 degrees until your left is east if you’ve ever “tongued” anything:

envelope, Jello Pudding Pop,  et al.

slap your knee until standing still if you give and receive in wrong ratios. 

from the squatting position, slow trot 

and sheepshank your neighbor’s chukka

if and only if you’ve never, ever,

stuck your finger up your own ass.

Now turn again

say amen.

time’s up,

you’re done.

don’t forget to rate your date

(and follow us on Instagram)

I miss you Betty Sue

on the state route connecting

the shitty little towns

where all my loved ones live

I pump and pump the pedals of my baby blue

10 speed

towards the light

at the top of the hill

 

by day

I’m the only lefty on the team,

fat with good arms

so coach Larry puts me in for the king,

Mark Bing, who meets me after practice

dragging monkeys,

one of whom has a harelip and the last name, Yunk.

this is not an abdication

or a coronation but a declaration

of my fate should

I pretend to the mound

 

at night

I wear black to distract the eyes of the law

and old men

under porch lights

begging to be vandalized

as I work that bike uphill

 

behold! on my ass

the halogen lights

of a diesel downshifting,

grinding in for a kiss

i hold out my hand (as I am spoken for)

and go tumbling down a ravine

dotted

with bush hogged saplings.

one of which goes through my knee.

the only thing

I could think 

before the knee dawned on me

was,

mom’s gonna fucking kill me

for riding after dark.

A Really Good Landscaper Named Edward

he loves history but he doesn’t know shit about movies

He didn’t know he was in a car with the Minotaur

who was going to kill him--

that he might be thrown off a cliff,

he might get shot in the back

or he might have a job.

it was a ford taurus for fuck sake.

straight off a cliff to the end of the world

when he realized he did not have to be like Coyote.

all he had to do was use the cue--

 

when the music swells

and the weeds move in,

its time to cry

Helpline

after 37 minutes an operator,

determines she's found the perfect person,

is happy to transfer me,

she's happy to remind me too,

that, 

as always,

they have a website.

 

after 20 minutes anticipating the perfection

due to me,

I give up.

But there you go.

we wait, don't we?

for the things we want.

on the things we don't want.

In line, on the phone, wringing our hands,

smoking our cigarettes.

We wait for good bound,

finally, to shift bad unopened 

to the corner of the table

(we're expecting company tonight)

waiting on what didn't exist

until we produced 

the children who we anticipate 

will make us proud.

We wait for them to stop looking through us

for something they can't even see.

Alternative Therapy

I was sitting at the booth that we gravitated toward

if no one else was there.
it was too loud before to notice,
but that shit seeped into my subconscious
started taking tiny shits deep in the folds of my shoulder muscles
had to champ down inside my cheek to keep from grinding my teeth
it wasn’t no premonition, like they want to say it was
it was that goddamn song, “we didn’t start the fire”

we were all fours on that nasty floor
but like when you go out in the dark
from the light,
it takes a minute to adjust the volume too
from 6 dozen conversations
over pancakes at the diner to full on crime scene.
they had a man in back barking orders
up front was auditorily doused
no one eager to be a hero.
but the speakers were still on. and that song.
along with the breathing and the whimpering,
I had a feeling these guys planned this thing,
it was goin allright.
traumatized probably, but for fuck sake,
Everybody should survive an armed robbery.
it doesn’t have to be dead bodies all the time
like the CSI.
Nick Stokes gone wild cat again.
butchest mother Hen on TV

Phantom Limb

The dogs find their pace

In the stubble on the bank 

of the river we walk everyday
Into reverie, they lead me, snuffing, squatting
Our distorted tableau sun-cast upon fetid water.
I salute
Catfish rotting
In weed, victims of aberrant freeze
To these hounds, coated in bourbon,
I drink in this dream

Where I finally have nothing to lose

Anchorman Gene Jennings' Last Live Newscast

nobody gives a shit about you and nothing will ever happen to you.

accept that nothing will ever happen to you.

you will never get mugged
shark bitten or
blown up at a gender reveal party.

Cowboy,
you won’t get to be a hero with that handgun.
terrorist immigrants will never take your job
because your life is boring 

and nothing will ever happen to you.

you will die.
that will happen to you.

you will continue to be a good producer until you can’t,
you will retire and then nothing will happen.

Your kids turn shitty,
but nothing ever happens to them.

the land is red-assed and
barren from
assaulting and battering

no stories…
dot dot dots.
to be continued
something will happen to someone,
but not you.

Bloodbath at the Sharyland Dairy Queen Starring Don Dokken

Banana split dreams

and directions to a gold mine

flap and snap in the wind 

like sheets on a clothesline.

westerlies on the ass end

about faced 

post-eighties.

Don's Lincoln Town Car

got as far as

Sharyland then quit.

out of context into obscurity, 

Don’s meteoric rise from blizzard jockey to 

shift-leader was documented in the manager’s daily log.

Then that jerk-off showed him the gun.

Was a Saturday black hole,

post lunch/dusk, 

dinner rush buzzing on the radar, but

just him and Javier at the moment

and the

minute this guy jingles in

Don thought, shit, this

is not going to be one of my normal transactions.

Nothing on the DQ menu was gonna satisfy this kid’s cravings

between him and the exit

Don clocked two white-hairs tongue-probing

dip cones.

The kid,

all twitchy

lifts his hoodie,

smooth belly,

with a side of semi-automatic.

orders a large Big Red and motions toward the register

Fuck the DQ man, let him have the money.

Fuck this punk too, though

tapping on the counter with the pants slung low

Don playing pin the

finger on the magic key,

mumbling the exact Castaneda incantation

that unleashed "Belt Buster"

the brutal,

conclusive

alter-ego

Don had been grooming since

Elm Street 3