EVER TOLD YOU?

Has anyone conducted a note of alarm I have what the have nots have not had the conduct the plain bloody facing it my words not my words overdue to be returned and the zipper resealed over my mouth that would be better it has always been better I cannot brush it it will only go in one direction towards the end and this is running out of chunks of waste never desert always have that made a big fucking hole in the universe in my head and the desert is still there going in and going out and collecting collecting dust collecting for some cause some expired beauty that looks so stretched and tired holding its eyes open so wide enough for the vast emptiness to slide out onto the stage the edge of the stage and tumble into the darkness to be pissed on by the front row. Deserted airships floating inside that lump in the throat it is the lump pregnant with deserted airships colliding into nothing to say nothing to offer.

This life is running out was from the first moment you lifted your head from the blanket and looked at the light like urine streaming into a room people in stiff white clothes mumbling except for when they shouted I'll just put my head back down don't speak up putting it back down until my chin submerges into her menstrual revision of me circling the stairs of the apartments where I guess we thought we lived or was told moving my arms use these things that shake and are useless circling the stairs under all this water looking up into the sky filled with endless wave upon wave of flooding smothering me my world won't be breathing for much longer too long hold it hold it and death no circling the stairs shit stop it about the drown in my own overlooking my own underwhelming utterances I'll just put my head back down won't speak up putting it back down until my chin submerges into her menstrual revision of me thought we lived or was told moving my arms use these things useless things that shake and are circling the stairs under.

She will call and she will ask what I asked and I will go over it many times before she will call and she will ask what I asked what I repeated and angered the lot cast beneath and behind rear windshield between two excuses the same pattern of humiliation nothing new beneath and behind prescribed for mites replacing the secretions of hesitation. 

"Did you see that?"
"See what?"
"You looked up at the moment I noticed it."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"You didn't see something fly like a dark bug into the blinds it's probably in there."
"I am not disturbing the blinds and have whatever it is or isn't fly into my mouth or into my body by some means."
"By some means?"
"I also hate bending or breaking the blinds."
"I hate the way my fat ass stomach just bunches up and folds my damn arteries like a bloody hose throbbing. Why can't stomachs be like pillows that lose their fluffiness and get flat?"
"Instead they're more like all kinds of fucked up shapes from my body derailing through some nightmare."
"You said you don't want something that isn't to fly into your mouth. How could it do that if it isn't?"
"Just an expression that fell out of my butthole."
"Tell me the one about the lawyer."
"The lawyer?"
"And what fell out his butthole."
"It was an accountant and the tube in his ear."
"You mean his eustachian tubes?"
"No someone jammed a tube in his ear over some tax audit that ensued from his filing and what came out."
"Brain leakage I reckon."
"This is the one with the thought balloon remember? You thought it was funny and asked me to retell it a while ago. When we still had water and electricity."
"And food."
"And food or that wasn't you it was the woman."
"In the glasses and the purple and black patterned blouse who went over the wheel."
"Over the wheel. Right. That's how they said she went. Over the wheel."
"When there was still a they."

We were flushed out
from the ocean
to the rim where the land
collects all the shit 
on the coast
yanking each other's chains
shoring up this waste
until it collapses back
into the stained pool
we were flushed out
from the ocean
to the rim where the land
eyes fooled by the sight of heat
we were flushed out 
from the ocean
the tank quiets
the Earth's crust has formed
memories of dried waste
what disillusionment smells like


- Max Stoltenberg

DUNGBEETLE COFFEE

He lay in bed looking as if he might fall out spotted by no one but the thud laying there sweaty exhaling the dust into the legs of the nightstand stumpy dusty corner legs who doesn't have their headphones in? who is that? report them to me before they let their noise disrupt what half of my ass I have left to give to the day. Correction, report them to him I get carried away when it looks as though he's had an accident and won't be stirring about the pot not from the night before not too long before less than a couple of hours actually but stirring the pot with so much sticking to the sides we'll be headed for another collision sooner than we think suppose it'll get stuck in our throats and make us cough that way we did at one of those parties long ago when they asked us to leave not because of the cough mind you but all the other stuff that gets caught in one's throat and makes it difficult to carry on a conversation or face the scrutiny of those too impatient for the delayed ends of sentences.

"How is it?"
"It's OK I guess."
"Really?"
"No, not that good really more of a resemblance of all the other disappointments throughout this I guess you could call it what would you call it?"
"Life?"
"Is that what you'd call it?"
"More like when you try to get candy out of a box and someone has pushed the tab in."
"I feel as though I've been given a tremendous lack of opportunity to do what I do almost somewhat adequately."
"Are you going to try some more?"
"They used to always say before you go in to have a list."
"A To Do list?"
"More a list of questions to ask, but I never could think of any. Think of what to ask so few words from loud towering people. Guess that's why I would spend so much time looking up at tall abandoned buildings. Only then they could overshadow so few words and such long silences."
"Do you think art is what drops off the conveyor belt or what stays on it or both?"
"Whatever gets caught in the gears or none of the above."

Water that makes up
most of her
is evaporating
long hair returning
about to be cut
cashed in 
not as much this time
this time this wretch
before a break
from the disturbed sleep
turning on the fan
unplugged from the wall
the wall blocking out
replicas of your insecurities
turning on you


- Max Stoltenberg