Poems and Essays
Ruminations of an Angry Cow
Open Heart Surgery
Love is a large incision in the chest
a pounding heart exposed by the scalpel
The Melting Snow
A little more of your white privilege melts away each passing day. You sound the alarm, blow your whistles, dial 911.
The Big Bad Wolf
He sat by patiently
as one by one the hairs
on your chinny chin chin turned gray.
And That’s When People Get Hurt
So moving forward, to help the police better communicate their intentions to the public,
I offer 10 improved mottos to paint on the side of their cars:
When Billy Tuggle Asked Me to Step Into a Time Machine and Choose the Direction
The rotting smell of death surrounds me
as I step outside the closing doors
Fuck, I knew I should have chosen the past
Cattle Cars
The delusionality of labeling “happy” the animals we send to slaughter
feels like proclaiming there were lots of “happy” train passengers in Germany in the first half of the 1940s
Like smoke wasn’t billowing either way
Dear Hobby Lobby
How can you carry glitter
in passion rose, silver peacock,
petal pink, and sunrise shimmer
and be homophobic?
How to Kill a Lobster Without Feeling Bad About It
Dead, processed, packaged
Once swimming around
Plunging into boiling water
A painful death
Jayland Walker’s Killers (We’re Not Okay)
Jayland Walker’s killers
Walk the street
Spraying tear gas
Emptying canisters
Like they emptied clips
Light Your Lamps
When peace… is shattered into pieces,
and the shards are but more rubble on the street,
light your lamps
Watering Dead Plants
I stopped to water dead plants today
Out of obligation or hope,
I’m still not certain
What I Wanted to Say
When I ordered the veggie burger and you asked me,
“If you wanted something that tastes like meat, why don’t you just eat meat?”
Stairway to Silence
Learning your step dad’s path
was no longer climbing stairs,
only falling down them
I’m Trying to Write a Happy Poem
I’m trying to write a happy poem
but the canvas continues
to be splattered in red
Crayola Crisis
But blue / can mean sadness
And every day / there is enough of that /
to go around / I have built no immunity /
to that shade of blue
Thick as a Brick (Refrigerator Remix)
But the hour-glass rapidly winds along
Father time casts shadows too
What do you do
When the old man is you?
Pop Songs for Popcorn Movies
You just keep singing the same damn lines, Kenny,
over and over
You aren’t giving me much to work with