by Burnham, Bo
The biker gang rode for years and years
through blood and sweat and mud and tears,
through snow and sand and dust and leaves,
and the poor old guys were just looking for sleeves.
Linda
Linda went skydiving
with her pet rat, Max,
and it looks like she
mixed up the parachute packs.
Donald
No matter our race or color or creed
or way of life or species or breed.
No matter our height or girth or scent,
we all hate Donald because Donald is a fucking dick.
Unstick Me
Unstick me, woman. Dial it down.
Your grip is an aging chicken’s and yet,
here I am—stuck, sticked.
Don’t make me whip out a cheap lamp
and melt this cell into a motel room.
From the Puppy’s Perspective
I’m stuck in this thing and I’m wanting to leave.
There are holes in the thing that hiss when I breathe.
And the more that I sit here, the more I believe that I’m stuck in this thing and won’t ever leave.
Back at the kennel, the whole cage was ours but maybe these walls are better than bars, or maybe I’m hurtling skyward to Mars
and maybe those holes are actually stars!
Conversation
“Well…,”
she said, unwell.
“Well…surely…,”
she continued, unwell, unsure.
“Listen,” he said.
But nothing.
Just some rain tapping a window out of boredom.
Heart Surgeon
In his long career as a heart surgeon,
in his life full of valves and ventricles,
full of tumors and heartache,
rumors and arteries.
In all those years of blood and tears,
he’d never seen anything like this before.
Hanged
I hung myself today. Hanged? Whatever, point is I hanged myself today and I’m still hanging.
I feel fine. Just bored. I keep hoping that someone will come home and cut me down but then I keep remembering that if I knew someone like that I wouldn’t be up here. Bit ironic, right? Or is that not ironic? I read somewhere that, like, anything funny is, in some way, ironic. But I don’t know if it’s funny or not. I don’t think my brain owns “funny,” you know?
I feel taller. I like that.
I’ve never been away from my shadow for this long. It had always clung to my feet, parting momentarily for a quick dive into the swimming pool. But never for five hours. I like it. There’s three feet of space between my two and the floor.
I wanted something this morning. I may be stuck. But at least I’m three feet closer to it.
Nothing
Are you terrified, as I am,
of nothing?
Nothing scares me more
than nothing.
“What’s going on?” I ask, trembling.
Don’t you say it.
Don’t you dare.
Stars
The stars buzz around me
all lovely and green,
with a bright swirl of dusty stuff
dancing between.
As I lay down in bed,
I still can’t conceive
that they’ll carry on gamboling
after I leave.
Hello, My Old Friend
Hello, my old friend!
You silly old clown!
How’s that mountain of life you’ve been tumbling down?
How’s that little line segment with infinite points?
Has the red rust of time been kind to your joints?
How’s that worn path of safety?
Has it led you astray?
What’s that? How am I?
Oh, I’m okay.
:’(
The heartbroken high schooler
compares his search for love
to his laptop’s search for WiFi.
So random, so fickle, so futile.
Coooooooool.
Gay Parading
Why do these gay guys always parade around, being all gay?
Like, two months ago, I was at this gay pride parade and this one guy on a big gay float kept parading around, real gay-like.
Same thing happened fourteen months ago.
Same spot.
Same guy.
Parading around.
Jesus
I found Jesus once.
He was in a diner eating hash browns.
He had one of those long booths all to himself.
He wasn’t being greedy or anything.
Place was pretty empty.
I watched him play the crane game on the way out— the one with the metal claw and the cuddly mass grave.
He kept going for a rabbit in overalls.
The claw couldn’t lift it.
Eventually, he gave up and left.
I tried for a bit.
The rabbit’s just too heavy.
I think whoever owns this thing put an unmovable toy rabbit in there just to fuck with everybody.
Strange Adjectives
Me,
with my strange choice of adjectives.
You,
with your muscular teeth and clockwise vagina.
Gone
That small turn she did, that one swift pivot, the one she did by the water with flats scratching the sidewalk, her hair catching up seconds afterward, fucked me.
Gypsy
On Wednesday morning, clear and calm,
I went to Astor Place
and had a Gypsy read my palm
or maybe just my face.
She said my heart was heavy
and my head was stuffed with lies.
But things like that weren’t on my hand,
they hid behind my eyes.
The room is dull and dank and cold but at least I have a hand to hold.
Bar Joke
A priest, a rabbi, and a horse walk into a bar.
The bar bursts into flames. The horse escapes,
only to drown in a lake later that night.
As for the priest and the rabbi? Turns out
they were just two other horses. My mistake.
I’m Smart Like a Genius
I’m smart like a genius.
You’re dumb like an idiot.
I’m handsome like a prince.
You’re ugly like a regular person.
You’re slow like a dumb slug.
I’m fast like a cheetah. Nice knowing ya, SLUG!
You’re poor like one of those people who shops at that stupid puppet store.
I’m rich like the guy who owns that stupid puppet store.
Your girlfriend sucks.
I don’t have a girlfriend which is way better ’cause your girlfriend sucks!
You’re clumsy like a bad waitress.
I’m suave like a good usher.
You’re weak like an old plastic spoon.
I’m strong like a really good-looking guy.
I’m two thumbs up. Way up.
You’re two thumbs down. Oops!
You’re an ant.
I am the wise praying mantis.
When you walk around, people point and laugh.
When I walk around, people point and smile.
You suck.
I don’t.
I don’t suck.
You do.
I’m smart like a genius.
You’re dumb like an idiot.
The Grade
My first draft got a B+,
so I made one small revision.
I got the paper back.
What the fuck’s an F÷?
The Farmer
The lying farmer tries to sleep.
He’s drifting off while counting sheep.
Tucked in wool, hand-knitted covers,
the farmer counts his former lovers.
I Want to Beat You to Death
I want to beat you to death with a blunt object.
I want to grab one of those high-end fashion mannequins by the ankles and bash your rib cage in.
I want to sharpen fifty pencils, bind them with a rubber band, stick the lead ends in your mouth, and punch the erasers.
I want to strap you to a bed of nails and then strap that bed of nails to the hood of my car so I can watch you suffer as we drive over speed bumps in a mall parking lot during an earthquake.
I want to burn your dog in front of you, mix his ashes with gunpowder, melt his bone-shaped name tag into a small metal ball, load it all into a musket, and shoot you in the face with him.
I want you to somehow survive a terrible car crash and then somehow not survive a small fender bender on the way back from the hospital.
Don’t
Don’t talk with your mouth full
and don’t breathe with your throat full
and don’t swim with your stomach full
and don’t dance with your colon full
and don’t fear with the ground full,
full of your poop, that is, because it will become soil.
What a world.
Public Speaking
The nudist, sweating, with smudged ink filling in the cracks of his palm, approached the microphone, took a deep breath, and imagined the audience clothed.
Woman
I. AM. WOMAN.
I am, quite simply, woman.
Deal with it, pigs.
Strange
I feel strange.
Half light-hearted, half heavy-handed.
You know when you get a song stuck in your head
and you can’t get it out?
I hate that.
That’s sort of what this feels like.
I feel better.
Less panicked, more confused.
But a good confused.
You know that feeling of warm water
running down your back
when washing your hair?
I love that.
That’s sort of what this feels like.
I feel great.
And nothing.
This is just what I needed.
A warm bath and a quick nap.
Sirens
I feel poetic when I say that the group of young teenage girls at the mall rattled my psyche
like wailing sirens
and that their freshly developed breasts
could make for quite tempting cider
should Satan decide
to pick and press them.
I feel honest when I say that the group of young teenage girls at the mall rattled my psyche
like the other group of teenage girls I once
saw scissoring in a porno,
and that their freshly developed breasts
made me wrestle my inner lunatic to
the ground,
bind his hands behind his back
and draw him a crude sketch of the young
girls scissoring to keep him from screaming.
Crazy
You think I’m crazy?
HA! That’s real funny.
If I were crazy, would I have written a twelve-hundred-page novel without using a single vowel?
No. ’Cause I did. And I’m not crazy.
If I were crazy, would I be able to predict the future by dropping empty tuna cans into an open drain in my backyard?
No. ’Cause I can. And I’m not crazy.
If I were crazy, would I love to slit your fucking throat just to watch the color drain from your face and onto that cleanly pressed collared shirt of yours?
Yes. I would love that if I were crazy.
But I’m not crazy.
Mannish
People say you look like a man
because of your arm hair.
Don’t listen to them.
It’s your jawline.
The Epiphany
He was fucking a pussy and sucking a dick,
his happiness fully depleted,
when he noticed the people attached to those organs,
and instantly knew what he needed.
No to Drugs
I said no to drugs once.
I looked a bag of weed right in the face
and, like a loving but firm father,
I said, “No.”
I was really high.
Ashley
Little Ashley hung magazine spreads on her wall,
after picking the magazines out in the mall.
Models and actresses, singers and more,
with cleavage and makeup and glamour galore!
All of her heroes were finally nearer.
Her whole room looked perfect—except for the mirror.
Clowns
Most people fear
the evil clown,
squeaking his big red nose in a dark barn.
I fear
the off-duty clown,
out of his costume,
impossible to spot,
sitting next to me on a bus.
Turn-Ons
The way her hair barely touched her shoulders,
like it knew to stop growing there.
The way her lips teased each other when she spoke,
parting and embracing with every syllable.
The way her tight virgin nostrils twitched and spasmed in the moonlight,
quivering like two horny monks.
The way her curly, almost pubic eyebrows framed her
fishy, moistened eyes.
I’m a face guy.
Pigs Are Smarter Than Dogs
Pigs are smarter than dogs.
That’s a fact.
That is “science,” if you will.
Will you?
Pigs are smarter than dogs.
I love my dog.
I also love eating bacon.
So I can stop eating bacon
or I can continue playing a quiet and aggressive role in the genocide of a species whose intelligence sits safely in the middle of my “worthy of real love” spectrum.
Or I can continue eating bacon and admit that my love for my dog is a sham, a hollow and meaningless relationship born of my own insecurities and years of confirmation bias.
He likes me because I feed him.
That’s it. Fuck him.
Bacon is delicious.
A Ghost Story
Two young boys in corduroys
were playing with a ball.
Two young boys heard one strange noise,
coming from the hall.
The boys stood still, well, still until
the door swung open wide.
And a ghostly chill and a real ghost, Bill,
were heaved the heck inside.
The brave boy stood, as the brave boy would,
and said, “Hey, listen Bill!
We’re here to hear you, not to fear you.
Tell us what you will.”
The other boy wheezed and sneezed then seized
and vomited on the floor.
He shook his brain. He felt insane.
Nothing was real anymore.
“Ghosts are real?! They’re fucking real?!?!?”
he cried and shook and feared.
For nature’s laws were gone because
a ghost had just appeared.
And on that night of fear and fright,
the brave boy had his thrills.
And the other one was fucking done
and swallowed fifty pills.
Let’s See What the Robots Think
Before we go folding our clothes in a stack, let’s see what the robots think.
Before we go patting ourselves on the back, let’s see what the robots think.
Before we start working or dancing again, before we start writing love letters to send, before we start fighting or finding a friend, let’s see what the robots think.
Plate Spinner
I want to be a plate spinner,
I practice all day long.
But I just can’t seem to get it right.
What am I doing wrong?
Ed
Ed had a date with a girl that he liked
but she called and she canceled the lunch.
At the biweekly orgy later that night,
Ed pleasured himself by the punch.
Right, Left
Right when you left, you left me
cold
and broken
and numb—
partly because
your love warmed me
and made me feel whole
and made me feel things I hadn’t before—
and partly because
you left me chopped up in a freezer.
Masturbitosis
I’m the sexiest eukaryote alive.
My mitochondria are so big and powerful.
Look at my fucking Golgi apparatus.
I fucking love it. Yeah, that’s it, Golgi.
Keep pinching off lysosomes for me.
I got such a sexy shade of cytoplasm
and my fucking vacuoles mmmmmmm!
Don’t get me started,
oh my fuckkkinnggggmmmmmmmm.
Fuck, I can feel it in my nucleus.
It feels so fucking good.