Remember some sort of ultimate reality, you ask.
Sure but in my secret life not in public places
Not on my silk lapel but wadded with Kleenex
Colored chalk dust and tobacco shreds
And not with you, dude. The realm of grace
Blossoms in the act of not exposing.
Explodes when I clutch it under my overcoat
Fasten my leather fist at the collar just
To make sure and face into the first November
Squall and dash against the red light.
You didn’t tell anyone you were coming, you remark.
No, I wire to my heart, know you’ll never
Notice with the concerns they have—the pothead
Kid, the pension headed south,
The suspicious growth–but if it explodes, you know,
You’ll notice, I’ll be the one left apologizing,
Picking up checks, wrapping eyeballs in soggy
Cocktail napkins, muttering lamely
About appointments, sticking bloody wads in my shoulder
Bag to see what I can do alone.
I don’t need to think an ripless alibi, I whisper.
I don’t need one to be nowhere.
Void is its own best witness, always, dude,
Here in this transitional parking lot
There’s so many layers of forgetfulness,
Discarded rolodexes and fax machines,
New Thai bistros in old Masonic lodges,
Hazmat from our frenzied re-inventions
Pitched in dumpsters daily. Who has time to look?
We pivot, clutch our collars. Cross quick on red.
Robert F. Gross–Sun in Sagittarius, Moon in Libra, Cancer ascendent. Favorite writers include Edward Lear, James Purdy, Richard Foreman, Jean Genet and Robert Duncan. Recent pieces appeared in Sein und Werden, In Between Hangovers, Anti-Heroin Chic, and Uppagus Magazine. Accomplished melancholic, living alone without pets or plans for the future.
–Background (2) & Foreground Photography by Jon Damaschke