Showing posts with label October is for Monsters. Show all posts
Showing posts with label October is for Monsters. Show all posts

Tuesday, October 29, 2024

Inferno

 

I dreamt your house

was on fire.

 

It was glorious.

 

I sat watching

with a bowl of popcorn

in my hands,

feet up, but then

stood up

because it was

 

Just

So

Good.

 

Your bastards ran screaming

like rats bailing

shipwreck.

 

You were quickly trying to sell

your other properties

to cover the damage,

cover your tracks,

but you were exposed—

your toxicity burning bright flames

and black smoke into the night.

 

It’s sad the way I carry

your cancer around with me,

scrubbed like Silkwood,

wet from tears,

splotchy from the rough handling.

 

Maybe one day I’ll show up

with lawyers and evidence and therapists

and sue your ugly, fat, creepy, meddling,

manipulative, controlling asses.

 

My last will and testament reads,

if ever I’m found dead in my car

before then,

with no explanation for the wreck,

 

there’ll be a church by the side of the road

trying to steal my body

and feed it to their fellowship flames

wiping blood from their cult-stained hands.

 

But, not to worry,

until then I’ll be cutting pieces out,

rolling them up in poems for Jesus,

 

and you know what He can do with a whip.

 

 

© 2024 Jennifer Wagner



Wednesday, October 9, 2024

Fall

 

How cozy that morning

when the deer were in the yard

at daybreak,

soft glow from a book light,

coffee cup in hand.

 

How forgettable

after all that’s passed—

when the floors heaved

and rocks grew up through the boards.

 

When everything shook,

even the air rippled too warmly

around my head,

 

my ears hammering,

tuned in to ghosts

screeching in the hollow, to

the scream that

happens before the crash and echoes

ever after,

 

when my veins stopped

cold,

flatlined,

 

in the bite

of

your

words.

 

 

© 2024 Jennifer Wagner

 

 

Monday, October 7, 2024

Phantom

 

Disappear, float away.

It’s that easy.

 

There were daisies in my dream

and filtered sunlight.

No faces, though.

 

Which is how I get through—

it’s painful to meet all those looks.

My eyes are violet, that is,

unsure of what color they are.

 

Is haunted a color?

Hollow?

Heaven?

Helpless?

Something rare? Like an eclipse?

Or as common as goodbye.

 

I am opaque.

I am goodbye.

 

My eyes are the color of goodbye,

always gone before you get there.

Arrivals make me nervous;

leaving gives me comfort.

 

I’d disappear, float away

if I could

now.

 

But in the dream

the pasture had daisies,

my arms covered in golden light

and someone reaching for me.

 

Don’t be alarmed,

this already happened long ago,

remember?

 

Eden died, we all know that,

just don’t want to believe it.

Daisies were only part of the dream.

 

The shit on my boots,

however,

is real.

 

 

© 2024 Jennifer Wagner