Daily Archives: April 10, 2021

Eulogy (YDF)

you dumb fuck

you dumb cracked vessel
you dumb negation of evolution
you dumb as a final mingle in the boys’ room at your high school
you dumb thinking you’re gonna miss this
then treating every interaction for the rest of your life
the same dumb way

you dumb fuck

you toxic little germ

you spitting toxin like some bad banger
you fawning over everyone like they too spit toxins
you thinking you are all in the same toxic club
you dance like one toxin settled in your feet
another one settled in your born-toxic throat
and you sing like you spit
the same toxic way you always have

you toxic little germ

you claimant to the stab throne

you claim a heritage you didn’t inhabit
you claim something beyond that
you stake a claim and it takes up the air in the clean room
you claim you know the way to the sharpest edge
and then the time comes
and you come up blunted
you wannabe quitclaim

you claimant to the stab throne

you beyond the point of shame jester

you shame of a blistered little boy grown not up but down
you got to preach redemption to smother your shame
you take a shame enema to flush it all out
you had a shame cloak and wore it the fuck out too soon
and when the time comes you dumb fuck
when the time comes you toxic little germ
when your time comes to claim you for its own
don’t try to say
you are more ashamed than proud
at how everyone’s going to wipe their mouths
free from the taste of your name


Absence

To wake up naked, alone,
tracing the empty outline
next to you with your finger
before rising,

is to think of the mourning doves
who are no doubt outside under the feeders now
and imagine you are in communion
because you imagine you could understand their calls.

To stumble from room to room this early
without needing to be quiet;
to use her favorite curses for the junkie upstairs
and his parade of suspect visitors;

to put off breakfast until this aching
is so inadequately addressed; this is how
you get through a week without her
being here, all while knowing

there’s more time like this ahead.
Knowing it will end, but not soon enough.
Knowing she’ll come home,
but not soon enough.