the corpse
is always
the life of
the party
at a funeral

hello again it’s me
that head cold you
thought had long
since said goodbye
never to make its way
back to this part
of the country again
but surprise! here I am
at the doorstep of your
nasal cavity begging for
a place to crash for a few
days—mind if I crash on
the couch & hey do you
still stock the fridge with
that great frozen pizza?

the drone
dropped
its payload
high above
the Afghan
desert, an
algorithm
calculating who
lives or dies
beneath
the all-seeing
eyes of
satellites
swapping bad
jokes in binary,
a reddit post
gone wild
disrupting
the work
of our
robot
overlords:
see what
terror sets
in motion,
a goldberg
machine of
planes &
towers &
fear & anger
& platoons
& isn’t that
the way it goes
until someone
finally says enough
& funny how
it’s never
who you expect
& of course
all this tech
was supposed
to make
our lives
so much
softer &
I’m still waiting
for the jetpack
& hovercraft
the 1950s
promised &
we are oh so
close thanks
to this never-
ending war
but now we
look for the
robots delivering
pizza, packages
from Amazon,
& bombs from
Uncle Sam &
we’re all guilty
of something
worth dying for
so look out:
the skies
are watching

it’s thursday
which of
course means
we made it
through the
first part
of another
shitty week
so only two
more days
to go until
we get to
do it again
but this time
with feeling

the screen
bleary-blurry
before breakfast
I stumble through
news of war &
rumors of war
while my cat
licks & ponders
his ass &
isn’t this
the plight
of our
existence

lemon is not
the cure for
everything
from wax
build-up to
sore throats
to sink de-
greaser but
damn if it
doesn’t make
sugar water
taste damn good

the sky this evening
was something else
a rutabaga perhaps
or an elephant
trumpeting joy
in pink swaths or
candy floss sticky
sweet & empty
yet satisfying
as all midwestern
things can be

the summer storm
swept in from the south
with winds whipping
trees to fury;
a duck’s hiss of hail
pummeling us to safety

what unexpected luck
to find the greyed lean-to
in the middle of the wood
your hair a mess of wet
stuck to your forehead,
your t-shirt clinging
like the old flame
I would soon become

& isn’t it just
like a storm
to suck the air
out of an unwalled
room & leave
you panting &
wanting more than
anyone can give

sometimes a goose
is just a goose
but sometimes
it’s a murderbot
so don’t stop
the car, gary

it’s never what
you think it is
but thank god
it isn’t what you
thought it wasn’t

outbound plane:
heat waves on tarmac
propel empty promises

the squirrels
or maybe chipmunks
because squirrels
get blamed for
everything so
let’s not jump
to conclusions
but anyway
something dug
up the tulip bulbs
& gnawed them
to bits so sorry
about that

sleep arrives
on a metro bus
belching passengers
on to sidewalks
filled with street
vendors hawking
diet advice & cheap
seen-on-TV products
& maybe that’s why
I woke up in the
night to pee on
the corner fern;
forgive me, I was
distracted by the
shiny Rolexes

the wasp
writhed wet
smears on
the deck,
its nest
a pulp
dot mashed
beneath my
birkenstock—
let me go
as fast
& unexpected,
a flash or
gasp before
oblivion