Monday, September 19, 2011


I Am the Worst Teacher

“What’s your poem about,” I ask
The little girl in the front row.

“Death nullifies hope and love,
And the world will forget us.”

She smiles and holds up the paper.
It’s written with ten different crayons.

“That’s wonderful,” I exclaim.
“I love the part about forgetting.”

I move on to the next desk,
A little boy using markers and glue.

“What’s your poem about,” I ask,
And I see he’s drawn skeletons all over it.

“Mine is about dead bodies in graveyards.
And all the wasted suit jackets underground.”

“Genius!” I exclaim.
“Death is such a rich and powerful subject.”

I move on to the next desk,
A little girl with pig tails.

“What is your poem about,” I ask.
She looks at her feet, shakes her head.

“Please tell me,” I plead.
“I’m sure it’s brilliant.”

Her fingers clench the paper,
Lips pursed to the side.

“It’s about an old grandfather
Who rapes his grandson in the basement.”

“Yours is the best poem of all,” I proclaim.
“You get a gold star on the wall.”

Her pride bubbles up onto her face,
Washing her eyes with sparkle.

Her classmates pout and sneer,
Wishing they had thought of it.

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Friday, September 2, 2011

Tuesday, August 30, 2011

I Am Very Angry

There's this thing I wanted you to do--
You didn't do it!
Or you didn't do it correctly!
Now I'm very angry with you,
So angry I'm forced to tell you about it:

My emotional state should be approximately happy.
I should be content, satisfied, passive, sated.
Instead, I feel this void in my life
Where the happiness would be,
The happiness which would have resulted
From the thing you should have done
When I asked you to do it,

Goddammit.

If I use greater lung capacity,
Higher volume, and sharper enunciation,
Will you be persuaded not to make the same mistake again,
Or correct the mistake you've already made?

This is very taxing for me emotionally--
Scolding you like this--
So I hope something's getting through,
and I'm not dumping my inventory of passion
Into an unfeeling, uncaring, unsympathetic furnace.

I want you to squirm but not to cry.
Crying makes me feel like a cruel person,
So you need to shut up and absorb this berating
With a sufficiently anxious frown.

When I was a small child,
I often found myself monologuing in empty rooms.
I need you to be here to listen to this
Or I will look like a crazy person yelling at the wall.

My skull is filled with razor blades.
Did I say that out loud?
I want to eat your dumb eyeballs.
You're being so stupid right now.

Monday, August 22, 2011

Internet Sage

He has seen every youtube video.
He has read every Tweet.
He's memorized everyone's newsfeed.
He has viewed every tumblr,
Every image macro, every animated gif.
He has absorbed every article
On every blog, webzine, and news site.
He knows the names of everyone on Facebook--
Their interests, favorite bands and movies.
He remembers every comment you've ever posted.
He's seen all the LOLcats,
And he's seen every clip of pornography,
Gruesome beheadings, and celebrities smoking crack.
He's explored the internet's deepest recesses,
Its darkest corners, its hidden crannies.
He finally understands it all.
A wave of clarity washes over him.
An ethereal light shines down.
His body vibrates with the electric rhythm of the universe
As well as cumulative red bull consumption.
And a great cosmic truth blooms in his mind:
He needs to get a fucking job.
There is no blogger app for the iPad. This is disappointing.

Thursday, August 18, 2011

I wrote this article. I'm filling the internet with garbage I think. You're welcome?

What My Final Act in Life Will Probably Be

Jayson Musson is one of my favorite artists/writers/satirists I can think of.






Tuesday, August 16, 2011

Monday, August 15, 2011

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Read some Justin Chin poems between increasingly frantic bouts of writer's block/creative bankruptcy.

"Lick the dry shit out of my sweaty buttcheeks.
I've had my hepatitis shots so it's okay
Lick my butt
cos I'm an angry ethnic fag
& I'm in so much pain
So lick my butt."


Monday, August 8, 2011

Here's an article I wrote for thought catalog about bathrobes.
Miracle Socks

I always knew socks were a miracle.
It's why I rejected flip flops and slippers.
Their soft fabric surface caresses my foot,
Shields it from the abrasive interior of the shoe,
Keeps it warm in chilly weather,
And soaks up the toe sweat during summer.

I have an unspoken heirarchy of sock brands,
Socks I refuse to wear--too loose or short.
Those socks that barely stick out of the shoe,
I do not like those socks.
Those socks with the yellow band down the edge,
I do not like those socks either.

But then there are the sacred pairs
With perfect length, tightness, and fit.
These are my secret treasures,
And I wear them until the bottoms turn brown
because I don't like doing laundry really.
I toss them next to my bed in a smelly pile.

I always knew socks were a miracle,
but it never occurred to me to invent miracle socks.
Look how sexy that old man's legs become!
That doctor prescribes socks to his patients!
That lady hates her gross leg veins!
They energize you somehow.
And there's a CG illustration of leg anatomy.
Not only that, but you get two free tubes of foot goo.

Everyone's in so much pain,
Or they don't have enough energy,
Or they're scared of how their legs look.
When will health insurance cover these socks?
Don't they understand they're a miracle?

Sunday, August 7, 2011

I am becoming increasingly obsessed with poet, playwright, and actor Edgar Oliver.










I just can't believe he's a real person.
Scott Pilgrim Versus the World

Ramona’s aloof bitchy expression,
Her icy condescending comments,
Her casual infidelity,
No, that is a bunch of bullshit.
Everyone seems confused at the end
As to why in God’s name Scott
Would still be interested in that bitch.
She’s not smart, interesting, or endearing
Not in any way, shape, or form.
Like so many snobby hipster bitches,
She only has her thin veneer of affectation.
Knives says, “Go after her,”
And even Scott seems baffled.
“Did you see the rest of the movie, Knives?”

Thursday, August 4, 2011



The Lost World: Jurassic Park

1.

Jeff Goldblum watches in bemused horror
As his daughter suddenly performs a gymnastics routine
In the old dilapidated warehouse.

A velociraptor is poised to eat his face,
Claws outstretched, mouth gaping,
But it too has stopped to watch her perform.

She flips and twirls on the metal bar,
Expertly swinging in a blur of rapid spinning.
‘Why is this happening?’ wonders Jeff Goldblum.
‘Can I eat it?’ wonders the velociraptor.
“Is dad impressed with my gymnastics skills?” wonders the daughter.

For what seems like forever
They watch her perform,
Jeff Goldblum and the raptor,
Lost in bewilderment,
Utterly dumbfounded,
Together.

2.

Vince Vaughan holds a giant tranquilizer gun,
And explains how the neurotoxin acts so fast
You’ll be out before you feel the prick of the dart.

Vince Vaughan spews saliva into Julianne Moore’s hand.
 She wipes it on his chest and says, “Your gum!”
Then he spits his gum in her hand.

Vince Vaughan says “You gotta love it.”
And Jeff Goldblum says, “I’ll love it when it works.”
And Vince Vaughan says, “It’ll work when you love it.”

Vince Vaughan looks up at the T-Rex
As Volkswagen size jaws tear apart his friend,
And blood sprays across his face,
And lightning forks through the sky
And chunks of his friend rain down like confetti,
And everyone’s screaming screaming screaming.
And under his breath, he whispers, “You’re money, baby.”

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Cutest Living Creature On Earth?



The slow loris is—and this is incontrovertible—the cutest living creature on the face of this planet. Its eerily gargantuan eyes seem to stare into your soul. Its tiny human-like hands are simultaneously creepy and adorable. Its owner tickles it, and it reacts like a fat kid getting a full body massage. When it sleeps, it lays sideways with arms outstretched like a drunkenly passed out frat boy. You think, ‘This is not a real animal. This is a Stan Winston animatronic device,’ but no, it is fucking real, ladies and gentleman. Never have music and images been so perfectly matched together as in this video.

Would you like a slow loris? Would you like to cradle its soft squishy body close to your chest as you fall asleep, staring into its glassy soulful eyes the size of two basketballs? I certainly did, and so I googled information about acquiring this jungle beast. Allow me to inform you on some of the characteristics of a slow loris unseen in this charming youtube video.

Slow lorises never stop pissing. Yes, the slow loris marks its territory with urine. Constantly. For the entirety of its life.

Slow lorises like to bite your fucking hand. They like to bite sometimes, so the people who kidnap them from the wild frequently rip their canines out. Unfortunately, without their canines, the slow loris can’t consume its natural foods, and so they die from self-loathing and starvation.

Slow lorises are covered in POISON. The slow loris has a smelly toxic gland on its elbow which it likes to lick. Afterward, it coats its entire body in the toxin. No big deal.

Slow lorises bite down and never let go because they want you dead, asshole. The slow loris is notorious for biting down on your hand and refusing to release its jaws. According to Wikipedia, “Animal dealers in Southeast Asia keep tanks of water nearby so that in case of a bite, they can submerge both their arm and the slow loris to make the animal let go.” No wonder these guys have no qualms about ripping their damn teeth out.

Slow loris bites are toxic. So after licking its toxic elbow juices, the slow loris will probably bite your hand (because it hates you) which will cause a painful red swelling. No, it’s not fatal, but it will illicit a degree of trepidation.

Slow lorises die of being pissed off all the time. Being stuck in a cage all day and night stresses slow lorises out, and they hate it, so they die. It doesn’t help that they’re most active at night while owners are usually asleep or that they’re susceptible to infection and excessive bleeding due to a network of veins close to the skin. Over time, the ongoing release of potent stress hormones, illness, and intense feelings of existential despair will cause them to die.

Slow lorises are illegal to own. Maybe I should have just started with this one. Yeah, so you can’t buy them unless you know a shady motherfucker in the Phillipines. Even then, they’re endangered, so the karmic retribution from the universe would be severe. For me, it’s enough just watching the youtube videos over and over until the voices in my head stop screaming.

Tuesday, March 29, 2011


Normal Face

It’s important to always make sure
That your face is your normal face,
Your normal everyday regular type face,
That it’s not contorted grotesquely
Into a scary face or a weirdo face,
That your tongue is inside your mouth
Where it typically sits behind your teeth,
That your eyes are staring ahead
And not crossed or rolled up inside the skull,
That your cheeks are not filled with air,
Not puffed out like chipmunk cheeks,
That your mouth is closed firmly,
Not hanging open or dripping saliva,
That your eyebrows aren’t raised
Or moving up and down for no reason.
Your face must be neutral in most situations
Like standing in line or talking to a girl,
And you must check constantly
To secure it against sudden insurrection.
Take a photo of your normal face
To construct a standardized system
Of measuring the normality of your face.
Use your tongue to check for tears.
Imagine your face muscles as a delicate machine
That must be carefully monitored at all times
Like a Japanese nuclear power plant on your head.
But sometimes it’s hard to know for sure
What expression your face is making.
Run your hands over it like reading Braille.
Feel the familiar contours and fleshy hills,
The folds of skin and moist shadows.
What is your face doing now?


Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Hollywood Blockbuster

When our family’s Christmas home video
Was released in movie theaters across America,
I sat in the back rows of each screening,
And watched everyone watch me
Open my presents.

I receive a Cinemark gift card from Gamma,
And the audience roars with applause.

I receive a gray polo shirt from Sean,
And the audience whistles and shouts.

I receive a pair of skeleton gloves and a fake moustache,
And the audience shrieks and bangs their heads together.

I drink eggnog and blink intensely at the camera,
And the audience jumps to their feet.
An old woman begins weeping.
A teenage girl passes out cold.
A boy shits himself with joy.
They can’t stop clapping.

It wins every Oscar,
Even the one for best foreign film,
Even the one for best animated film,
Even the one for best adapted screenplay.
And even the one for best special effects

This is a story I tell myself
When I’m editing my family’s home videos.
Is it really so ridiculous?
I’d go see your family’s home video.
After all, even a trillion dollar budget
Can’t buy honesty.

Friday, March 4, 2011

I have a painting at the Under $500 Exhibition at the Luminarte Gallery in Dallas this Saturday at 7PM. The address is 1727 E. Levee St.  Dallas, Texas 75207.
I'll be reading poetry at some dealy this next friday. Here are the details if you want to come see me. Quite frankly, I doubt I have any friends who would pay ten dollars for poetry especially when I'm only reading one piece for three minutes, but it sounds like a damn poetry circus, so should be interesting.

Friday, March 11 at 6 to 9 PM

ft great poetry and story telling by :

Buddy Wakefield (International Poetry Slam champion)
Joaquin Zihuatanejo (International Poetry Slam champion)
Richelle Gemini Scott
Ethan McClure
Infidelix
Brad Pike
Naidle Alexander Wieters

ADMISSION IS $10 BUCKS. CASH ONLY! ALL AGES.

Location: UNT - Golden Eagle Suite (The main building at UNT with the student bookstore in it. Suites are on the third floor. Parking is free but read the signs to make sure.)

Thursday, March 3, 2011

Chernobyl

After the explosion came the clean-up:
The firefighters tasked with extinguishing the reactor,
Felt pins and needles on their skin,
Tasted metal in their mouths,
Which later scientists would realize
Were burning radioactive dust particles.
These firefighters stood for hours
In radiation 40 times the lethal dose.
They puked and shit themselves,
Dizzily stumbled around the roof,
Skin inflamed in a strange red rash.
All of them died of radiation poisoning.

And then came the debris clean-up,
They brought in American robots to move objects
With advanced grabber arms and retractable scoopers.
When the robots failed,
Their fragile circuitry fried like onion rings
They sent us into the disaster site
To toss radioactive cylinders with our bare hands
Back into the nuclear reactor pit.
They called us “the bio-robots”.
In the cold nuclear winter, we raced
Across the plant’s roof as if on fire,
We had only one minute at a time to work,
One minute to move a nuclear rod
Or pound stone blocks
Or clear debris from the roof with a tractor.
One minute before seeds of cancer
Bloomed in our guts like flowers.

Helicopter pilots dropped chemicals on the reactor.
Two pilots died of radiation poisoning.
Three men drained boiling radioactive water
From the cooling tanks.
Two of these men died of radiation poisoning.
We raced across the roof like children playing a game.

Bio-robots they called us.
Someone has to do this job, they told us.
We have to be brave and do the work
No one else dares to undertake, they told us.
We are national heroes, they told us.

But years later, while she sleeps next to me,
I run my hand over her curved belly,
Imagining what sort of nightmare monster
I’ve planted inside her,
What three eyed Gollum grows there,
Like a living breathing cancer.
Can I love a brain dead husk?
A half-human half-octopus?
I was so brave back then,
And now I’ve never been more afraid.

Monday, February 28, 2011

Sunday, February 20, 2011

Look At All These Damn People

You meet people, and you can hardly summon
The cognitive strength to hold a conversation
Because they’re hardly people at all,
Less than people, less than chalk outlines of people,
Less than dead skin piled in the shape of a person,
Less than a virus, less than igneous rock,
Less than space, less than the dark matter between space.
These people want to talk to you about nothing.
They want to talk to you about CSI and Justin Bieber.
They’re polluting the earth with their cow-eyed children
Talking for hours about their industrialized livestock children,
Ignoring the fact that their children have no future,
Ignoring the fact that these children are dumber
Than any previous generation of children,
That everyone agrees the future is barren deserts and lava fields,
And isn’t that a form of child abuse if you think about it?
To thrust small children into a hopeless dystopia,
And then later claim with a strained lack of sarcasm,
“Well who could’ve guessed it would be this bad?”
And they have no hobbies or interests that matter,
And they look at their spouses with dead eyes,
And they’re offended by anything honest,
And they’re offended by anything dishonest,
And they’re offended by their own bodies,
And they’re offended by most movies,
And they only love movies about the 1800s
And they only love movies about English royalty.
How many hundreds of millions of people exactly like them,
And they all think they’re unique.

Friday, February 4, 2011

Worked on making my way through the poetry submissions for the North Texas Review.

Painted some ocean waves.

Ate a bowl of spaghetti.

I haven't been outside my house in a week.

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

I will make at least six paintings this semester.
I will also write ten short stories this semester.

Promise.
Soundtrack

Some people feel their life has no meaning,
That they have no purpose in this world,
But I will tell you a great secret
That will allow you to feel
Your life is exciting and meaningful
In the way that a framed photo of piss
Can make piss exciting and meaningful
Or a piece of poop on a museum pedestal
Can make poop exciting and meaningful.
First thing to do is walk around.
Walk in a park, to school, anywhere really.
Now, put on your headphones,
And listen to the soundtrack to Inception.
Let it become the soundtrack to your life,
Imagine yourself as a character in a movie.
You are not yourself living your life,
But a person in a mental movie theater,
Watching yourself live your life
With an awed popcorn munching detachment,
And it is exciting and meaningful,
An Oscar award winning biopic.
Your daily trials and troubles aren’t mundane.
They’re the narrative engine driving forward
The sprawling epic adaptation of your life,
The most important story ever told,
And the only one that really matters.
For some people, this is all it takes.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Knowledge

The day approaches
When I will know more
About the Marvel Universe
Than the actual universe,
The day when someone asks,
“What is the Purple Man’s power?”
And I say, “Mind control,”
The day when someone asks,
“What is Nick Fury’s clone’s name?”
And I say, “It’s Max Fury of course,”
The day when someone asks,
“Who are Spider-Man’s clones?”
And I say, “Kaine and Ben Reilly.”
The day when someone asks,
“What are the laws of motion?”
And I stare off into the void,
Lost in a world I don’t understand,
Terrified of what I’ve become,
What I’ll never be again.
I will be reading poetry at UNT on Friday, March 11 from 5:30pm to 8:30pm. I don't know the room number yet, but I hope they figure it out soon.

The headline act is this guy Buddy Wakefield.

His readings are intense and energetic. He doesn't subscribe to the "awkward deadpan" school of poetry reading like I do.

Friday, January 28, 2011

The Haunting

Some houses are haunted by murder victims,
Civil war soldiers, or melancholy brides.
My house is haunted by cavemen.

I wake to guttural voices,
And four Neanderthals cower around my bed,
Clearly disturbed by my clock radio.

I try to communicate with them
Using hand gestures, basic sign language.
They only shriek at me and wave their arms.

When I’m making pancakes in the kitchen,
They poke at the flame with see-through fingers,
And try to grab the pan with hands made of smoke.

I can’t turn the TV on because they hate it.
They think it’s a portal to the afterlife.
They think Everybody Loves Raymond is hell.

I brought in a famous TV psychic
To explain why they haunt my house.
He said they were terrified of my ipod dock.

I pressed him for more information.
He said they were terrified of electricity.
Also, fire, carpet, and the golden retriever.

He shrugged his shoulders,
And said they don’t speak English.
Then he went home.

All day and all night, they shriek and hoot and squeal.
They run around the house naked, flailing, wide eyed.
It’s not scary, but it’s very distracting.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Giraffe

If we can breed man-eating wolves
Into yippy dogs the size of pigeons,
Surely we can take giraffes from Africa,
And breed a smaller domesticated version
That can sleep in my laundry room at night,
Peer over the fence at neighbors,
And give me rides to and from class.
Let it dream of roaming the savannah,
Plucking leaves from the tallest tree,
And kicking lions with legs like flagpoles.
Let it long for a world it could never live in,
Where a coyote couldn’t slip into the yard,
And snap its long neck with one bite,
Where a human couldn’t leap on its back
And ride it around like a damn horse,
Where all giraffes weren’t forcibly neutered
For reasons never fully understood.
Where is my mini-giraffe?
Where is it?

Tuesday, January 25, 2011



Bargain Bin Rats

Pay attention, America.
There is a sale on rats.
All rats in America are on sale.
These rats are on sale for ten dollars.
These rats are bargain bin rats.
These rats are clearance rats.
These rats are discount rats.
These rats are previously owned rats.
For the price of a Playstation 3,
You can have forty rats.
You can have a Playstation 3
Or you can have forty rats
Watch the rats run
Around your living room,
Around your sister’s bedroom.
Around your parents’ refrigerator.
Cash in your parents’ life insurance policy,
And buy ten thousand rats.
Ten thousand rats or a new house.
You can have a new house or ten thousand rats.
What are you going to name all your rats?
This rat is Chester.
This rat is Samantha.
This rat is Christopher.
This rat is Brian.
This rat is Janice.
This rat is Tyrone.
This rat is Marcel.
This rat is Pasha.
This rat is William S. Burroughs.
This rat is Dakota Fanning.
This rat is Glitter.
This rat is Sparkle.
This rat is James Bond.
This rat is Horse.
Would you like your rats in a bag?
Do you need special rat food?
You don’t need special rat food.
All food is rat food.
Give the rats all your food.
Bake ten thousand cakes
And give them to your rats.
Ten thousand cakes for ten thousand rats.
You can have ten thousand cakes or ten thousand rats.
How could you afford not to buy these rats?
All rats are twenty five percent off.
All rats are fifty percent off.
All rats are seventy five percent off.
All rats are free rats.
Take all of our rats.
That’s ten thousand rats.
We’ll ship the rats to your house.
We have special rat crates.
The special rat crates are made of Styrofoam.
Watch out for biting rats.
Biting rats may bite your other rats.
All rats are biting rats.
Please enjoy your rats.
This is from a poetry reading several months ago at Dan's Silverleaf. My delivery is flawless. You're welcome.


Sunday, January 23, 2011

Old People in the Future

Thirty years from now,
There will be old people who love rap music.
They will have no trouble with cell phones.
They will be on Facebook,
They will be pirating music and movies.
They will have video blogs.

There will be old people who skateboard,
Old people who smoke pot,
Old people who wear hipster glasses,
Old people who watch MTV,
Old people who vote democrat,
Old people who text each other.

But they will still have problems
Understanding symphonic hydropop music,
Operating quantum computers,
Installing cybernetic upgrades,
Hooking into holographic feeds,
And they will never use bio-electric telepathy.
Fruit Analogy

A Swedish scientist explains how a hadron collider
Smashes protons together to find new particles.
He holds out various fruits to help illustrate the process.
Here is the pear; the pear is a proton.
Here is the grape; the grape is a top qwark.
Here is a squash; the squash is a graviton.
I am a down’s syndrome boy learning long division,
And I feel his great cognitive strain to convey his ideas
In a way that regular people will understand.
His eyes glitter with secret knowledge,
The unfathomably colossal intellect,
The understanding shared only by super-geniuses.
Nations pour out their treasuries for men like him.
Architects and engineers devote their lives
To building massive mile long steel tunnels.
Cranes hoist structures the size of skyscrapers,
Install complicated scientific measuring devices,
Exert a trillion gigawatts of human ingenuity
To construct this stepping stone to total enlightenment,
And I watch this all on the television set
Alone in my parents’ upstairs living room,
Eating cupcakes and sipping an energy drink,
Wondering what poem I’ll write for my blog tonight.
There is a universe of thought you will never know,
And you are never as smart as you think you are.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

How to get free soda for life:

-Go to Chipotle.

-Buy a soda.

-Get a free refill.

-Get another free refill.

-Get another free refill.

-Never leave Chipotle.
Unicorn People

After the witch transformed us,
We lived as pearl white unicorns
Deep in the Tanzanian jungle,
Galloping alongside jaguars,
Impaling monkeys on our horns,
And drinking dew pooled in leaves.
One day we saw a dinosaur,
A brontosaurus grazing in the river.
Then he submerged and was gone.
We avoided the dancing singing natives,
But if one of them glimpsed us,
We stabbed him with our horns,
And drank his blood for nourishment.
We ran through a nebulous jungle dream,
Saw shimmering dark blue shapes,
Hazy mythic things rustling in the trees.

Then one day, the spell wore off.
Fleshy and nearly hairless, we returned
To our jobs in southern California
Where we waited tables at Chili’s.
Soon, the memory of being unicorns
Was washed away like a sandcastle,
And all we had was a skeletal image,
A vague outline of a shape of a dream,
And then there was barely even that.
We served chicken tenders and burgers
To chubby white people wearing ties,
We watched American Idol,
And washed our clothes at the Laundromat.
We stared into the mirror, confused, angry.
And this was all there was,
All there had ever been.
Football Fan

Sink deep in a leather recliner.
Steadily sip a can of Lone Star.
Breathe in cold air conditioning.
Watch physically anomalous men
Sprint like angry grizzly bears
In the scorching syrupy heat.
See their skin cry with sweat,
Their steely eyes beady with focus.
Deep fry a damn egg roll
While you peer at the TV.
Hope your team makes a comeback,
And then suddenly wolves,
Hundreds and hundreds of wolves,
An ocean tide of wolves spill
Out onto the field from every corner,
And they devour each player,
Rip their meticulously crafted muscles
Like nothing more than Buffalo wings.
No one can see their favorite player
Under the writhing furry mass,
And now the game is called.
No one wins.
Except me.
I hate football.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

God's Judgment

One day, a man came up to heaven to be judged by God. The man had murdered a family of five with a steak knife, dismembered their bodies with large hedgeclippers, encased each of them in bathtubs full of cement, and then buried the bathtubs deep underground at a nearby quarry. There was no motive. The only reason police arrested him was because he filmed the whole thing and posted it on youtube. Needless to say, God looked at his list of sins, and was disappointed in his creation.

"You violated one of my commandments," said God. "Thou shalt not kill. You violated it five times. That's pretty bad. It looks like you're going to hell."

"Wait!" said the man. "Why should I go to hell? You created me, knowing that I would kill those people. You gave me the drive to murder people and took away my self-restraint."

"Yes, but everyone has free will," said God.

"Not if you know what's going to happen. Not if you set me on a path, knowing what I'm going to do."

"Okay, but--wait, I'm confused. What?"

"You gave me the personality flaws that led to me murdering people, so if anyone should go to hell, it should be YOU."

"Hmm," said God. "This is an interesting idea. I will have to think about this."

He stroked his long white beard, thinking long and hard. Then he grabbed the man with a whale sized fist, and gobbled him up.

"Nom nom nom," said God. "Nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom nom yum."
I got a painting in the Big Mike's Coffeehouse Visual Art Exhibition. The reception is tomorrow at 7 PM at Big Mike's. My painting's the one with the black hole. It's called Black Hole. It'll be up for the next month. Your pupils will be like little black holes sucking in the image of my painting. SUCKKKKKKKKK.

Judgmental Dwarf

When I wake up in the morning,
I see a mean old dwarf hovering over me.
He’s chubby with a long white beard,
And he wears denim overalls and a purple hat.
“You are very ugly right now,” he says.
His beady black eyes cut into me.
“You should get out of bed,” he says.
As I brush my teeth,
He leans in close on the counter top,
His wrinkled face inches from mine.
“Your teeth are slightly yellow,” he says.
I make a bowl of fruit loops cereal,
And he examines it closely.
“What a lazy unhealthy breakfast,” he says.
His beard dips in the milk.
“Your cereal is hairy now,” he says.
“That’s disgusting.”
He sits in the passenger seat
While I drive to school,
His feet barely reach the seat’s edge.
“You left your blinker on,” he says.
“You drive like an old person.”
At school, he sits in the desk next to me,
Peering over at my exam scantron.
“Those answers are mostly wrong,” he says.
“You did not study enough, did you?”
I talk to a girl at a coffee shop,
And he cranes his neck to listen
Nearly tumbling out of his chair.
“You’re not very witty,” he says.
“She’s not going to have sex with you.”
At home, I curl up with a book to read.
He looks at the book’s title,
Licking his teeth and pursing his lips.
“That book received poor reviews,” he says.
“You have terrible taste in literature.”
As I fall asleep, he sits on my chest,
Listing my negative personality traits
And insulting my physical appearance.
Days pass, then weeks, then months,
And I stop getting out of bed in the morning.
I hide under the sheets and plug my ears.
I try to ignore the dwarf,
But I can feel his weight on my chest.
He’s waiting for me to do something,
Waiting for a glimpse of my face,
Waiting to judge me.

Monday, January 10, 2011


New Grocery Store

Have you seen the new grocery store
They just opened up by my house?
The outside is painted in Mardi Gras colors.
Their produce section has never before seen fruits
Like kangaberries, Dar Gar Mars, and Lizapoms.
The frozen food section is filled
With frozen clam pizzas and Manganese ice cream.
They have flea juice and radiohead cheese.
They have cockatoo heads and lizard blood.
They have human skin and pterodactyl breasts.
They have cakes the size of a high school gymnasium.
They have rocks and sand and ocean.
They have suns and moons and stars.
They have existential despair and Paul Giamatti.
They have dirty bombs and shotguns and biscuits.
They have your dead relatives, frozen, waiting for you.
It’s all there, all to buy, all discounted.
Here are some coupons from this morning’s paper.
You’re welcome.



I Will Eat My Own Face

Suddenly and without warning,
Rachel Ray took a steak knife
To the edge of her cheek bone,
 Sliced slowly vigorously across,
Cutting her own face off
Like her head was a block of cheese.
She had a calm facial expression.
Audiences thought it was CGI
Or some kind of practical joke.
Some of them laughed at it.

She placed her face on a cookie sheet
With aluminum foil underneath.
She sprinkled seasoning over it,
Salt, pepper, and Cajun spices.
Then she shoved it in the oven
And instructed us in a soft voice
To let it bake for fifteen minutes.
She tried to form a smile,
But she need not have bothered.
Skulls never stop grinning.

Cut to fifteen minutes later,
And she pulls her face out of the oven.
It looks like a generic lump of meat
With three holes and some mascara.
You’d never guess it was a face,
Maybe some sort of meat mask,
And now she puts it on a plate
With mashed potatoes and wine.
“I get so stressed,” she says to the camera.
“I mean, I just get so fucking stressed.”

Saturday, January 8, 2011

No More Redheads

There will come a day
When the last redhead dies,
The last strand blows away.

Regional accents will vanish.
No more pahk the cah
Or ain’t nuttin fer y’all.

Languages will disappear.
Small ones like Swahili.
Then big ones like German and French.

Skin colors will mix together
Into a shade of dull brown.
No more black or white people.

Finally whole countries will merge.
Boundaries between them will vanish
Or cease to be important.

And the media will celebrate
This great union of peoples,
The final stir of the stew.

But there will be no redheads.
They’ll all be dead.
And there won’t be any more.

Never Let Me Go

For two long hours
The only thought in my head
Is ‘Why don’t they fight back?’

They’re taking your organs
And you just go along with it?
What is wrong with you?

Attractive sad eyed English people
Roaming the picaresque countryside,
Whining about being donors.

Why don’t you organize a rebellion?
Kill those old people!
They’re trying to take your organs!

Instead you pose on the beach,
Looking deep and thoughtful
Like Urban Outfitters models.

Carrie Mulligan watches through glass
As surgeons cut out her friend’s organs.
Then she goes home.

I hope if you ever see someone
Cutting my organs out,
You would at least be like,

“Hey, don’t.”

Thursday, January 6, 2011

Malaise is Mental Mayonnaise

You want to believe you are important
That in a given day, you produce
Enough work to make that day worthwhile,
But you stop and read what you wrote
And it is Space Jam fan fiction.
The New Yorker will not accept it,
No matter how lush the language
Or how resonant Michael Jordan’s
Emotional and spiritual transformation
Over the course of five hundred pages.
So you sit in your rolly chair
And sip your Amp energy drink.
You eat some Christmas candy,
Chocolate Santas and peanut butter cups.
It makes you feel a little better.
You listen to The Go! Team on iTunes.
It makes you feel energetic and gung ho
About not doing anything.
You read a comic book on your computer
About Reed Richards building a spaceship.
He is so active, so productive,
It makes you feel like you’re being active
That you too are being productive,
But really, you’re just staring at jpegs.
You draw a funny drawing,
So you can say you did something,
But it is a terrible drawing,
And you do not want to claim it,
Do not want to show anyone the drawing.
You eat a bowl of picante chicken ramen.
That’s enough work for tonight, you think.
You go downstairs to bed.

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

A Poem About Sauce You're Welcome



The Sauce Palace

It’s all you can eat sauce
At the Sauce Palace all-day buffet:
Barbecue sauce, cocktail sauce,
Horseradish sauce, spicy chipotle sauce,
Chili sauce, mustard, and, ketchup
All spraying in arcs of brown, yellow, red
From the sightless eyes of stone deities
Like Buddha, Jesus, and Mohammad,
A sculpture fountain near the entrance,
And at the base of the fountain,
Children with plastic red buckets,
Scoop up the sauce with frantic glee,
And dump it into their gaping maws,
Guzzle it down their open throats,
Drink it in without pausing for breath,
And some of the kids are puking
But that’s okay, a normal occurrence
And the floor is coated with puke,
And sauce that’s dribbled from their mouths.
One boy dives into the pool of sauce,
Plunges deep below the surface
Into the lukewarm tangy stew,
Lets it all inside him all at once
And then drowns,
But even that’s normal, no big deal,
Not a concern, just calm down—
It’s the Sauce Palace,
And that’s how it goes.