Fred Aiken Writing

I really, really, really hope I’m right,

I just don’t know what about at the moment,

but when I figure it out, though I probably won’t, but if I do,

then I hope, I really, really, really do, hope that I’m right on the dot,

maybe an inch or two to the right or left,

but either way,

it’d be fucking awesome if I could be right about whatever it is I need to be right about

a back that breaks, made by papier-mache clapping together until soft bones

creak together on a hot summer night, filled with still breath lingering through the meadows

made of broken cartilage hanging on by a thread, sewn into the a pillow to lay down

and rest and be easy, don’t go yet,

play outside, just get me Tylenol before you leave

I’ve been pulling on a string that doesn’t seem to want to unravel,

but instead props up an unstable lie made out of whet dreams meant for no one in particular,

yet are replayed on a look in HD for an audience of none and none of your business

to watch as much as they like,

call it a fetish,

call it a waking nightmare,

but whatever it actually is, I don’t think you can bring it in with you,

no shirt, no laws, no convalescence, but ratty old shoes sitting on the porch

to be kicked off and splattered across the lawn