Art

For You – Forrest Muelrath

INCANDESCENT BLOB

OF HELPLESS MALE MATTER

Booze and amphetamine molecules

traversing side by side,

firing keystrokes

to reify meatsticks —

glistening pink

cellphone photography,

flying forever

across the ever expanding

boundaries of the internet

He's addicted to you.

He's powerless over you.

This vacationing,

anguished, hot monster,

after hiking for hours,

standing at the edge

taking snapshots

of the syphilis volcanos

all for you,

forever and for you.

Becoming an Expat

Getting a cheap apartment

in Queens

and never leaving

is a noble thing to do,

so is leaving the country

with no plans to return.

Either way, you’re an expat

finding some other way

to get by,

while all else

goes to shit.

Maybe things will look better

for a while,

Mets got a Cy Young winner,

fool’s gold til August,

or fast cash

on some wild stocks,

but the roaches

will still be there,

starring back

through the putrid humidity

of a New York summer night.

Find stable health,

hummed to a steady drone

of zero balance –

sell the car to a friend,

sublet the apartment,

work for others

as little as possible, and

get out of town,

before the Mets start losing

again.

There’s peaceful equilibrium

between poverty’s wretched madness

and the euphoria of belief,

in an aeroplane

over Queens.

Say nothing to the landlord,

and I am gone.

Crossing the Bridge Again

Downtown Brooklyn is a hillhole

     — a hole to pass between

     hills and hell —

       it's all root canals and court.

The best way out is always through.

Pledge your commitment to your dentist.

The ample hills are supple lies

as they drag your ass through the system

for no god damn good reason.

You look like an asshole, he says.

to her brother — a literal asshole,

with your lips puckered-up

   in the middle of your

          buttface.

— like this!*

How would you like a shake shack

to spill all over your civil suit?

A good idea for an app would be

to locate the nearest place to piss.

Thankfully, there are a plethora of public

      restrooms downtown.

 Among the dental offices

    and broken families.