poem of the day 11.29.10

crawling toward the win

an old woman shouts at me
says don’t print that receipt
think about all of the trees

i ask, what about all of those
political ads the politicians are stuffing
into our mailboxes?

the superintendent of the building
asks me if i heard the fire trucks
the other night

christ, he says
i was only smoking one little cigarette
at one o’clock in the morning

the neighbor’s dog growls at me
and keeps pacing back and forth

while i think i’m a fool anyway

three years and i wanted nothing to do with that dog
i get a little bit of scotch in me
and i think the thing is my best friend

the poems keep coming back rejected
the radio keeps going out
when a car passes on the parkway
the coffee is getting cold and the weather is hot

b.j. says that he has a stack of
books waiting for me at the bar

and humanity keeps slouching
toward its twilight

but the days are getting shorter
and another mediocre year is ending 33 days

hallelujah
hallelujah

i feel like i’m crawling toward the win.