day NINE HUNDRED and FIFTY TWO

what i should’ve said when the liquor store clerk

asked me if i was going to the neighborhood summer festival

i don’t like the summer

and people strolling around without purpose

the word festival means asshole in russian, i believe

there are too many cops standing in cop rows

with cop smirks on their cop faces

italian sausages and fried dough are over-rated

and reek of imperialistic decline

if you’ve seen one shitty band covering the beatles

then you’ve seen them all, my friend

you can’t drink beer on the street…probably because of the cops

there are too many people

wearing t-shirts with the american flag on them

too many toddlers waving american flags at cops

there are too many american flags in general

and i can only stand to look at american flags for so long

before i become filled with existential anxiety and dread

most of the people in this neighborhood

voted republican for president

we should put them in cages instead of immigrants

but we let them run amuck

eating fried oreos and playing carnival games

in their stained american flag t-shirts

making friendly with the cops

fried oreos are a harbinger of doom

no, i think i’m going to go home, liquor man

sit on the couch in a dark room with the shades drawn

killing the environment as i blast the a/c

and poison myself with the vodka and wine you sold me

i’m going to imagine something more

than american flags and cops and summer festivals

and fireflies and humid summer nights

and pale-faced rapist boys chasing pale-faced girls

i’m going to get blind, stinking drunk, my good man

listen to a little bit of the real beatles

sing something at the top of my lungs

until my upstairs neighbor

newly home from the neighborhood summer festival

becomes so enraged that she pounds down on my ceiling

until the plaster begins to fall

then maybe i’ll go the hell to bed.

--John Grochalski