12 AM
done with work

getting out of the
building and
heading home

There aren’t a lot
of people in
the streets
and I seem to be the
tallest one
around

“Bet you feel quite
safe from your
vantage point,” she says
inside my head

And I respond, “Life ain’t
about feeling safe.”

“Oh? And what’s it
about then?”

“Poetry?”

“Haha! I… can’t tell if you’re
being pretentious
on purpose in an attempt
to be funny or…”

“Or what?”

“C’mon, boy, revel in your
blessings a bit.
The lord had made you tall
and slim. Imagine how many
people can only dream
of having that. You have
long bones
and quite the ribcage, no?”

“The ribcage?”

“Yeah. You have a big rib
cage that makes your
belly look small, flat,
perfect.
Remember when you crossed the
lake just floating on
your back. That’s insane
lung capacity.
It’s a cool thing to have.”

“It is?”

“Hell ye. C’mon, fill it up!
Show it to the
world. Show ‘em you got
one huge ribcage, a big, big
protruding chest like
a rooster.
Would be a sin not to show
off when you truly have
something to show off,
don’t you find?”

“I’m against showing
off.”

“Oh, there you go. More
pretentiousness.”

“That’s being humble.”

“No, it’s being
pretentious.”

“Whatever.”

“C’moooon! Let’s do it
together. One
biiiiig inhale to puff
up that
chest real good right now.”

I’ll be damned. I actually did
it

while walking

Dragged a huge in-breath
and filled my
lungs with…

rotten air

I didn’t notice
I was passing by the
damn dumpster
and there was something
or many things
dead and rotting in there

rotten to the
point of
having flies and maggots
in the browned, gooey flesh

and I forcefully gathered
all that miasma
into my lungs

I gagged, my face wrinkling, the
guts in me twisting

I had to spit
lest I vomited

Dammit…

What the hell was
that?

Had I been…

pranked?

By one of my hallucinations?

Oh well, what else
could I do but
laugh along and move along?

I still love you
guys 

Many thanks to Gobblers by Masticadores for featuring my poem, "pranked"! 

Check it out HERE!

Thank you!

this Saturday
he wakes up in the
afternoon
and
curses his dreams

Goodness, how long
has it been
since the last pleasant
dream?
What about the last
nightmare?

Even nightmares were
better than
what he was having now

A void
a nothingness

empty

Which does remind him of
an older day when he
used to play some
videogame titled
‘You Are Empty’
on big bro’s computer

fairly good times
with nightmares that were
better than dreams of
nothingness

The game, horror though it
had been, did not give him
nightmares

big bro did

"Since you wanna play so hard,"
big bro had said, "we gon’ make
it more interesting.
Every time you die,
Perro gets the can!"

Perro was the little parrot
dad got him
before going away. It stood
in a small cage in
the hallway

and the can… It was
a can of bug spray big bro
used to spray the
poor thing with
when he was in a sadistic
mood
which happened too often

Mother was away
at work
or in the company of some
new man she was
trying to convince to
become a stepfather

She had very little
success with both. With
everything.
And she was tired.
At all times.

Big bro had all the power in
the house
so how could he not
abuse it?

It’s just normal to
abuse power
when you have it

The miracle is when
you don’t

but there are no
miracles

So Perro got sprayed
a lot

And got sick a lot
but didn’t die

His feathers fell off
and the scales of his
little feet
peeled off and looked
like boiled corn flakes

yet still
death would not
take him

Abused creatures have
their own way
to spit back into the
face of their abusers

It’s for this very reason that he
decided today
to make another visit
to his big bro in prison

Maybe even buy
something
nice for him

Many thanks to Gobblers by Masticadores for featuring my poem, "you are empty"! 

Check it out HERE!

Thank you!