poem of the day 12.15.15

chillin

smirking abomination

standing outside of our kitchen window

drinking a twenty-four ounce bottle of bud

in a brown paper bag

like some kind of teflon tough guy

basking in this climate change pseudo-december slop

who just told my wife

hey, babe, maybe you shouldn’t live on the ground floor

eight in the evening

screaming outside of our window

for fifteen minutes

wonderful, ecstatic white boy woo-hoos into the night

dude, dude, but duuuudde permeating the air

killing my vodka buzz

drowning out beethoven’s ninth

i’m going to throw him into the estuary

strangle him

i don’t know but what

storming out into the night

he must think me a madman

the way i circle, point, jab at his beer

ask him how much of a tough guy he is

you a tough guy? you a tough guy?

just like that

but what the fuck am i?

really i only want to be back inside

with my wife

with the vodka

with the beethoven

instead his friends go, bryce, yo bryce

maybe we should go because this dude looks pissed

bryce, i spit, because of course he’s bryce

bryce who can drink a twenty four ounce beer

in front of anyone’s apartment

bryce who thinks he can talk to my wife like that

of course your name is bryce, i say

he says, we’re just chillin

because bryce owns america and can chill

wherever the fuck he wants

he can talk to women however he wants

he can scream and shout and dude

and none of us can do a thing about him

bryce can interrupt vodka and beethoven

and hard-working people’s nights

you look like a bitch, bryce,  i tell him

a pampered little bitch

who can’t even do drinking in the street right

yo bryce yo bryce, his friends say

they’re already half-way down the block

i’m just chillin, bryce says

just chillin dude just chillin dude just chillin

like a fucking mantra

but bryce doesn’t know that i’ve been waiting on him

for months

for over a year

since my wife got diagnosed with breast cancer

and i wanted to fight the world

i say but tonight i’ve got you bryce

and your little bottle of beer

but he doesn’t know what the fuck i’m talking about

my wife watching me in the window

i don’t know what the fuck i’m talking about

the beethoven playing low

all i feel is sadness for this mess

i wish sometimes life handled things differently

i wish i did too

just chillin dude

bryce says, one more time

slipping past me

he hurries down the street

while i stand there neighbors watching

my wife saying, honey, come inside

but i can’t move

can still feel my worried heart

beating inside this hollowed-out chest.