(from my book: The Aftermath, etc. by Get in the car, Helen–published by Nate Jordon/Monkey Puzzle Press)
Aquariums, NY
Between the orgy
of yellow sunlight and brown coffins
bugs beat the living shit
out of each other
and then spend the next seventy minutes
buzzing around their own
beaten out shit
like bugs do
testily oblivious
listening to track 4 of Chinese Democracy
over and over again
yapping about
how the world is neither
round nor flat
it’s pile-of-shit shaped
while at the same time
sitting at a small table
off to the side
our daily tombstones
drink Bloody Marys
and talk about
the last time they were all together
and went spelunking
and fought about history
and made love all night long
like an angry Bob Barker
dressed up in a cowboy
shellacked thong
They talk about
all of these things
and smoke cigarettes
until the bill comes
an event which causes
everything to go uncomfortably quiet
like a dirty fish tank
beating off to
an old postcard of the sea
forcing the sentimental pile of shit
around which all the bugs have been spinning
to mumble something about
the stubby miracle of hope
as it exists in the age
of dead romance
and being that the tombstones
are such cheap unshakable bastards
and constant acquaintances
the waitress should stop waiting
for death to do the right thing
or be chivalrous
and just put all their drinks
on shit’s tab instead
which she does, almost begrudgingly
as the fish tank
beats off
to the sea
Multiverse Johnson 