jonberger

Flashes from smaller years:
He dives into rocks
yielding a bloody nose
exploding out onto the sand.

He gulps out drunken ugly tears,
glistening shards still in hand
from the bottle shattered hours before.
Red, again, everywhere.

An unseen dog behind him
leaves him broken-legged.
He hobbles, becrutched,
for an entire awkward summer.

He snores, unable to be woken
despite my mother’s best efforts
until he finally shoots up
shocked as we surround his chair
where sleep was so anxiously disturbed.

He cannot cross the street.
He is overheated, sweaty,
breathing is ragged.
Standing upright proves difficult.
An ambulance takes us all blocks
to a hospital
for a fevered few hours.

All of these
he survives
and others I’ve forgotten
or have never known.
He proves hardy in his frailty
and surprises us all
with relative ruggedness
for longer than ever expected.

The anchovie pizza is salty;
salty like the Baltic,
like the Dead Sea,
like a dead Sikh,
too late fled from Sodom
and/or Gomorrah,
and caught
then kept around
until modern times
to be a salt lick
that I do not,
in any way,
like.

The anchovie pizza
arrived far after
my interest in anchovies had passed.
Had the delivery come promptly,
I’d have enjoyed the pie
lacking any post-conceptions
but as it stands,
I am left with this circle of regret
that I will certainly not finish tonight,
not while it’s warm.

The anchovie pizza
is soggy
and cold
and salty
and I wish I had purchased something
more pleasing
and now
I have nothing but discontent
and a side order of disco fries.

If I were to meet any of Batman’s rogue’s gallery,
I think I’d like it to be the Mad Hatter.
He can tell people what to do,
hypnotically,
but he’s crazy,
so I get the sense
I could convince him
to use his powers for good,
by which I mean
helping me out.

If I were to meet any of Superman’s opponents,
I would like it to be Bizarro.
He’s so powerful
but pretty good-hearted
and maybe he’d take me for a flight somewhere
before accidentally squeezing me too hard
and making me into a diamond.

If I were to meet any of Wonder Woman’s enemies,
I think it should be the Cheetah
because she’s a giant sexy cat
who’d scratch my back
and also
she might be able to introduce me to Wonder Woman.

I haven’t seen a raccoon
in my neighborhood
at all this year
which is most certainly a good thing.

I spied
with terrified eyes
sometime last autumn
a couple of crazy critters
in my back alley
looking at me
as I looked at them.
They could not have given
a smaller shit
if they had just finished
dining on my carcass
and not yet fully digested
even a little bit of me.

I haven’t seen their stripes since
though I had heard
years before
of a neighborhood raccoon
that had split a neighbor’s cat
stem to stern
then left it
to drown in its own blood.

So the raccoons are gone
I hope.
I believe.
I pray.

I pray also
that maybe they were brutally murdered
(a boy can dream
can’t he?).

All you fuckers…
you dirty little fuckers.
You fucking hippie fuckers:
Fuck you.

It wasn’t so long ago
that I had somewhere to go
someone to see.
I had a reason to breathe
I had someone to be.
You’ve taken that all
away from me
so fuck you.

All you fuckers,
you piggy gritty fuckers,
you motherfucking fuckers:
Fuck you.

I thought I saw the light
in the darkest of the night
but the light was blinding,
my vision grinding to a halt.
And then came your assault.
God! Fuck you!

All you fuckers!
Fuck you, fucking fuckers
with your overweight Fuddruckers.
Fuck you.

I had hopes with you;
that you’d pull me through
but I learned with a chill
that you never will
so forever more, I wish you ill.
Fuck you.

Fuck you, fucky fuckers
when you get hit by drunk truckers
I’ll be laughing at you fuckers. Fuck you.

Please hire me.
I could use a job.
I would like
very much
to have some place to go,
something to do with my days.
I would really like
to order something on my pizza
other than garlic salt and ground pepper.

Find me work.
Let me have reason
to wake up before noon
and give me a chance
to meet people somewhere other than city parks and bars.

Please:
I could use some assistance.
I really need some support.
I insist that you provide me a way
to be of service.
I need a job
and it’s your job
to get it
for me.

Now that, sir,
that is good form.
You are doing excellent work there
and I am very impressed by your courage.
This is an hour
in which you don’t know who might be watching you,
hunting, ready to pounce.
You seem,
I must admit,
much braver than I would be
in a parallel situation.

And, again,
you seem to be doing quite an excellent job,
there.
I get nervous in front of crowds,
but you just take it all in stride, don’t you?

Your rhythm,
your speed,
all quite impressive.
Thank you, sir.
You’ve given me quite a lot
to think about.

To the Dude Masturbating Across from Me on the F Train Last Thursday Morning

Shit. Fuck.
Goddamn it
and god damn me
for losing step on that
which is truly important.

I had forgotten
– completely forgotten –
to check up on the post-Valentine’s Day candy sales.
What has happened to me?
Who have I become?
Days have passed
and I have failed
– 100% failed –
to eat even one slightly stale peanut butter cup
or nibble on a somewhat dented gigantic jelly bean.

What transformation has occurred
that left me
this creature
that can’t see a good deal
when the calendar throws it
in his face?
What happened here?
What am I now?

They rolled her out in a gurney.
She was barely lucid
muttering names,
but none of anyone around.
Her hair was wild.
Her teeth were out.
It was a bad scene.

She wasn’t happy
being evacuated from her home,
that much is clear.
But she hadn’t been happy in it
for some time, either.

There was a smell
that could not be distinguished
which dissipated
quickly in her absence.

While she’s gone
her home will be cleaned
and clutter will be excised
and path will be made easier to traverse
and everything that was problematic
will be resolved.

When she comes home,
her hair will be made
her teeth will be in
she will be blissful
and the skies will be visible
through her newly cleaned windows.

When she comes home
she will walk through the door
and beat the crap out
of everyone who interfered with her life.

When observed
be careful of what they might see.
Be thoughtful.
Be wary.
Consider the 360-audience all around you
and keep concerned
of which of your actions
might be remembered
and recorded
and considered
long after you’ve forgotten.

Imagine that god is all around you
like the force
or like a stalker
who will record you
inevitably and in an all-encompassing manner.
God may not care about the actions you think it does
but god is watching
through some celestial spyglass.
God knows
and you should know full well
that nothing is ever lost
and you
are always being observed.