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UNDERGROUND VOICES: POETRY
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JOHN TUSTIN The Kill Johnny droops on the sofa, fighting sleep, losing, watching a Spider-man cartoon and explaining it to me, jabbering in a sleepiness of little boys. Sara adjusts her bangles on my bed, eyes transfixed on her jangling wrists in her little-girl world I could never penetrate or pretend to comprehend. I pull another bottle from the fridge (Samuel Adams: Brewer. Patriot.) and eyeball the food you buy and have no intention of cooking or eating. How can I possibly extricate myself from you and still maintain my lifeline, my sanity? I carry Johnny to bed After I take him to the bathroom. Turn on the air-conditioner. Sara awaits Daddy’s arms, sleeping rear-side up in my bed. And I know you wait for me, circling, like a vulture for a dying herbivore, like a shark for a wounded fish. I’m weak. The kill is easy. You will sink in your fangs. And every day the light ebbs. Every day the life ebbs. A stuttering eddy of brackish water descends on my eyes, driving them dark. Driving them oblivious to my ending. An ending of powder, of silence, of alone. Like An Insect In Amber my bladder is full my left ear is pounding like a drum it hurts to swallow i put the covers over my head as my kidney nearly explodes so i climb over the bodies to the bathroom to let it out i stand sagging like a wraith before the mirror is this what i am? is this all there is? God where are you? i look in on the kids faces of bliss bodies twisted into comfortable shapes i cover them tightly kiss their foreheads whisper individual “i love yous” march my failing instrument back to bed crying tortured pained but still alive like an insect in amber motionless forever in the moment trapped wanting it to be over needing it to go on slouching broken and burning to the finish line Sick Like A Dog I started puking for the second time that night. I was sitting on the toilet, diarrhea having just tumbled down moments before. I flushed, turned, kneeled, let it out. Made an ungodly noise, water still rushing, filthy stinking sickening waterfall. I vomited in the bowl, on the seat, the floor, my pants, my shirt. It was everywhere. My legs were buckled. I was dizzy. She was in the shower. I cleaned up using tissues and toilet paper. I stood up to get paper towels and cleaner when she screeched, “You better get Clorox wipes and clean it properly!” Gut-sick, fevered, helpless. “Fuck off.” “What’s the matter with you now?” “I’m sick.” “What else is new? You’re always sick, sick like a dawg!” Lying in my son’s bed, shaking and moaning, sobbing gently, praying for an end to the unholy pain. Time stood still, the clock hands hammered into stillness, eyes burning like twin cigarettes in the ambivalent darkness. More diarrhea. I crawled to the bathroom time and again. Dizzy and broken. I couldn’t lie still, couldn’t breathe. The morning came and I was still there. And I still hurt. Starving, thirsting, legs throbbing. Ready to face the workday. And I never did use those Clorox wipes. John Tustin's poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in The Medulla Review, Gloom Cupboard, Carcinogenic Poetry, Sex and Murder, and others. fritzware.com/johntustinpoetry is the link to his poetry online. |
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© 2004-2011 Underground Voices |
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