DISMAL UNDERWIRES

They are watching this this is watching for where they are several weeks ago deflating the time bomb next to the oven stepped into it stuck to the bottom of this shoe-string budget not moving a muscle except when it escapes him and orbits around her navel a stagnant pool of excess trappings squeezed out of the peroxide analysis and she stares at you and stares at you and then asks no more questions marching up the stairs to the next expectation in getaway hideaway from no one because they are watching this this is watching for where they are several ago deflating the time bomb next to the reminder that clicks something in your jaw most of your jaw away from what you've neglected to do or think about unless you are attempting to fall asleep tried that one again.

She went to the store and couldn't find anything that had a color dark enough for her to find the abyss she rolled over into the other night and it led to the nightmare about the houses and the meteors and it went on for however long nodding off tormented her into thinking pretending she was away from the front, but she had slipped into the back where it was even more of the nonsense dripping through the ceiling over her pillow and into her ears slapping punctuating the irritants stuck between the lips chafed with his guff monster tilting the highway not very super twisting wringing out the cars straining out the have-nots.

They haven't been watching this this has not been watching them for wherever they are parades in traffic jams where the mezzanine spills out onto the courtroom floor black robes wigs and masks piled up for burning and no one has a match as they watch each other avoiding each other's eyes each other's whites of their eyes flashing along the wet curbs of the evening abbreviated by the tangles of extension cords and surge protectors asleep at the dead hamster wheel.


- Max Stoltenberg