aayoungmy fears are hidden at home in my onion knife
as I drink coffee that tastes like David Mamet
left it standing
downtown on a Tuesday morning
during a plague
somehow that proves
there are things I don’t regret
while we pretend to have enough choices left
the way a crumbling sidewalk shows us
dandelions will continue to grow
on the strength of their convictions
my parents were screaming
at each other
in Baptist curses
doors slamming
phones torn asunder
sounds of a home splitting apart at the roofbeams
my father throwing the floor model television out the front door
and one frightened sister
smuggling me out a bedroom window to another protective sister
that may not have all happened on the same night
it was so long ago &
this wasn’t constant
not your average weeknight at the Young’s house
but it’s always the first time
that matters most
normality
is a concept
invented by
a pharmaceutical
company
this little poem
feels like poetry
has died
then it remembers
even that
is a poem
it’s very much alive
you can’t make a bomb
powerful enough
to frighten me
you can’t make a gun
big enough
to make me shrink away
as there is nothing more terrifying
than living to fight
another day
the creature lighted
on my window
for a moment
before returning to the sky
as if to remind me
though wings become tattered
it is still
entirely possible
to fly
no death
represents a single loss
it is a lifetime of little ones
i didn’t just lose my father
i lost his voice
his cologne
him beaming as i accepted my diploma
the father daughter dance at my wedding
him teaching my sons to fish
family reunions under catalpa trees
but i remember the way he laughed
it was left behind in his grandsons eyes
and in
their gleeful bellies
his joy rising from the deep
it is simply
my favorite mercy
Critic: “Your poetry has taken on religious overtones as of late…”
Me: “Yes, as have I.”
Critic: “Why?”
Me: “I suppose it is a condition arisen from having played paper dolls with death my entire life…”
if there’s one myth
a Baptist can dispel
it is the misconception
that all Christians are friendly
.
thin lipped women
become more so
when i enter a room
.
men succumb to a case
of the glancing can’t help it’s
.
it took a lot of suffering
books read
and introspection
to achieve this level of
fuck you
i don’t give a shit
.
i love my life
i love living in my skin
i love my battle scars
i cherish my mistakes
as they became my teachers
i love my family in
all its grand dysfunction
we make spite look alluring
.
aw hell
let’s just go up
in the hay loft
talk about the power of forgiveness
and engage
in some heavy pettin’
how tranquil
it must be
sailing along
in the good ship right
upon a sea of wrong
that’s the blistering irony
about know-it-alls
sociopaths
predators
and candy coated pricks
who demonstrate
impervious response
they have a choice
whether or not
they acknowledge
their dysfunction
yet they leave us
none