jonberger

So, if
you’re in the back yard bushes
of some high school house party
and you’re blowing some guy
you just met
because you’re really drunk
and he says you have nice eyes
and he’s getting a little rough
with his hands
and calling you names
and then suddenly
some girl
– you think your cousin knows her –
comes falling out the sky
crashing on the guy
and bruising your throat
you can just accept that as your bottom
and realize that you might need some help.

Don’t get into that guy’s car
because he says
"the party’s kind of played out
don’t you think?"
and go off to a second location
without telling anyone at all,
all right?

All right?
Please?

The radio host said
“A woman could have solved cancer 200 years ago,
probably,
but her family told her to go back
into the kitchen
and cook and clean.
So we still have cancer.”

The radio host is clever
but he’s just scratched the surface
of the story.
I call conspiracy.
I suspect there has been
for hundreds of years
a consortium of women scientists
secretly doing technology
– only evil technology.

I’ll bet it was a woman
that invented cancer
and gave it to us
because she’d been forced
to stay in the kitchen.

All the evils of the world
were created
by the supra genius women
resentful of their lot in life.
They could have cured all ills
but instead created more:
Cancer.
AIDS. Spam. War.
Reality TV.

They are insidious
this evil science corps
of beautiful buxom women
but I am onto them
and will uncover their dark schemes
so long as I can convince them
to let me.
And then
that radio host
will get the story of his life.

I just want to be left alone
why can no one understand that?
If they just leave me be
this will all be over
so much quicker.

I was pretty upset
when I stormed up here
locking myself away
from all those annoying folk
at this annoying party.
Now, while my cooler head’s prevailed,
I’m stuck with that rabid pack of gossips
right outside the door.

I want to go home
away from Jacob
and Zoe and all the rest
of these smalltown idiots.

There’s got to be a way
to escape this crappy situation
and those awful little judges
with dignity intact.
Blackout?
Jump out window?
Climb to the roof?
Can I pretend I was kidnapped
or hypnotized?
How do I avoid
all the glares upstairs
when opening the door?

If I keep the door closed
this night might last
forever.

No, this is important.
You have to take some responsibility
for what you selected.
If you ordered it
you gotta finish it.
Despite your fullish attitude
you gotta eat that food, dude.

You know there are people starving in China, right?
Or at least Chinatown.
There are certainly people starving for good china
but I don’t think you can do anything about that.
However
you can help show solidarity
for those starving yellow youth in Asia
by cleaning off your plate.
Eat the food, dude.

I know it’s all cold
– because you stopped eating it.
This would have been a done deal
long ago
had you only opted to lick the platter clean.
It’s not too late, though.
Get to it. Do it.
Eat the food, dude.

We can keep at this
indefinitely, until the plate collects mold
collects dust.
The food can become dust
and even the plate can atrophy
along with the atomic structure
of the universe.
All things end eventually
and that includes this food/dude impasse.
Any time now
you’ll succumb
finish your meal
and we can go about our lives.
Just…

Dude:
Eat the food.
Please?

Really?
THAT’S all it took?

Excuse me
but you are at a booth
that seats six
and you’re eating alone.

If you could
perhaps
move to a smaller table
one appropriate for a group your size
my friends and I
would very much appreciate it.

We would certainly
more appropriately utilize
the resource
you are currently exploiting
and probably engender greater enjoyment
in the process.

If you could
not selfishly
renounce the space you have been actively squandering
it would be a step
in improving
the state of the world.
The business
would be able serve more people
and earn more money.
You might even feel less lonely
were you occupying a smaller space
so really
it’s all win for everyone
if you are so willing.

Anytime now, champ.

This is the last
fucking time
I am ever letting Artemis
talk me into any
fucking thing
ever fucking again.
“A party’ll be fun!”
“When your parents leave town
they never check up on you.”
“Come on! Why not?”
Fuck Artemis
and fuck that fucking drama queen
friend of hers.

If April stays secured
up in my bathroom overnight
I am gonna positively scream
– except the neighbors might come over
to check to see what’s wrong.
I want to use my own fucking toilet.
I might have had a bit too much
to drink, and
why is everyone here
in my fucking house?

I want everyone gone
and I want to go to bed
and I want to just die
in my own tub
and I want Artemis to kiss me again
and i want to be straight
and I can’t believe
I’m going to have to mop up everywhere
before my fucking parents get back.

Fuck this.
Fuck April.
Fuck Artemis.
Fuck my life.

I’m all right.
I’ll be alright.
I’ll get better.
This will pass.
I will not be in this forever.
I will feel better than this.
I will be in a more optimistic state.
I will find that chipper mood.
I am not dying.
This will not kill me.
I will improve.
I will survive.
I’ll surprise all of you.
I’ll get better.
I’ll be fine.

I told the comic
to kill the funny business
about national politics.
"Everyone here
is on the same side,"
I said,
"and every time you mention the president
you’re not gonna convince anyone of anything.
"Moreover,"
I said,
"it reminds me of the state of things
and it just bums me out.

"It’s much harder to laugh,"
I said,
"when I’m bummed out."

He nodded
thanked me for my advice
and changed his tune.

So why am I
devoting so much time
to pumped up political opinions?

Maybe
I want to be bummed out.

I should have gone to your show
like I wanted to
and watched you nervously handle the mic
and the crowd
and your excellent songs
where you sing of longing
and emptiness
and unrequited feelings
– all the things that everyone sings about
but you do so much better.

I should have followed you
into the evening
like I wanted to
and sought the adventures
that might have been therein

but the night is dark
and scary
and it’s unclear
what might be waiting out there
and you didn’t seem to wish
this gentleman to go
into the good night
with you.

So while I wanted
to be with you
you yearned
to be free
and it was clear
whose needs were paramount
at the time.

But if I knew then
what I now know
I would have stuck to my guns
searched for the fun
and heard what you’d sung.
I’d have gone out
to your show
exactly like I wanted to

and we would be

exactly where we are now.

He really hadn’t wanted the evening
to go this way.
Jacob’s a people-pleaser
and he is never himself pleased
when people get upset with him
ever since he got blamed
for Sister’s sprained ankle
when they played tag
out in the street
seven years’ back.

It might go even further
back than that
but he always recalls that day
as the core incident
in his story

Jacob wishes
he could talk to April alone
without all the people crowding about
this top floor bathroom
hearing the fight.
The disagreement.
Her meltdown.
He wishes there were no witnesses.

Even Zoe is in sight,
looking, listening,
laughing on the inside.
Zoe and he have a history
under the bleachers
in the backs of borrowed cars
over stained sheets
in pre-curfew woods.
He’d hoped
he’d have a chance
to express his people-pleasing skills
with her
before leaving the party
but April saw something
and somehow got the wrong idea.

And now?
Nothing but wrong ideas.
He’d hoped for a double header
but nothing is to come of this evening
with April locked away
requiring such attention
and Zoe looking on,
seeing him
chuckling on the inside
seeking to ease April to out.

Outside the bathroom
Jacob sighs.
Inside his head,
he knows this evening has gone to shit
as he begs before a closed door.
He is not at all pleased.