IF THEN ELSEWHERE

IF (he had needs OR a need for needs OR NOT needs

FOR (

someone else's property

a critique of another human

condemned Pittsburgh row houses

vacant lots with concrete pads, overgrown with sour-smelling weeds

sneering so hard it makes the makeup wrinkle

)) --note: i the selfish asshole proclaim

THEN (howl grind fifteen years of emptiness plus 

WHILE (how many longer?)

they are capitalizing on a scream of loneliness

we're all in the same boat but are we

there's a company at fault somewhere or should be

)

ELSE (mashing a cigarette into his pain) 

WHERE (a human in a money suit

tear your eyeball out and give it to me

goop hand into brain scoop scoop

rip it all out until what's left

doesn't lust, doesn't want, doesn't

give or care to be given a fuck)

END (this)

11/30/2024

Gallery of the Grotesque

black feathered wings stretch out, and out; in rigor mortis, held by hanging wires above


workbenches topping thin-wire cages--no occupants but bones: artifacts


whisper "how long ago?" to still snarling forms of passionate threat, mid-strike, mounted


upon the desks: once-bright knives and weird contrapts, chemicals in disarray, charring runs


where sinister or mournful acts once took the stage-- clatter shatters thick silence


it is only papers underfoot; only the complaint of ancient floors;


a fury of upturned books and broken glass on stairs that wind toward some looming fenestration overhead, overcast with gloom


from glass marbles in a lizard's head to the coarse fur of some clawed paw


wainscot below deep inset panels; dusty light from mouth-blown panes in painted iron muntins


smelling air with after-odors of the chemical decay and stares that silent scream


why is there no door?

11/5/2024