Robert Beveridge


Slander

Night-blooming coffee strikes
the window, beats the Notre
Dame fight song in the rain.
Sleep is elusive when the room
is lit every thirty-eight seconds
but mother nature cares not
for your eight hour need when
the Army-Navy game is afoot.
Resigned, you get up, turn on
the oven, pull out the chocolate-
rubbed steak to grind
for tomorrow’s witch nachos.



Bird Leaf

you look up at the sky
and brandish your gold-
foil-covered tomahawk
and yell the name
of every boss
who stiffed you
out of overtime

the clouds       the sun       six raindrops in a perfect circle

you took up painting
but your easel is lost
somewhere in the back
of your closet. Instead
you cover the walls
of your studio apartment
with depictions of fantail shrimp
who dance across the sky

the manhole cover       a shrub       scattered mushrooms

two weeks notice
always seems too long
but it gives you
just enough time
to finish the pieta
hidden in the storage room
behind the paper towels



Bouncer

The pickup truck phalanx surrounds
the camp, ready to attack when word
comes down. We have drafted our
meager defenses—canned food
gone bad, two platoons of armadillos,
six machetes with eight bullets
between them. Not much of a stalemate
but we expect the snake reinforcements
any minute now. Not that that helps
drown out the tick, purr, growl
of hungry engines. We stare at them.
They stare at us. We listen
to the drip of sweat from brows.



Half a Banana

if I swallow
a boiled egg
whole
will it just
sit there
like a monument
to my body's
present shape?



GMO

Talked to the dentist
about plungers, the carpenter
about his recent pilgrimage
to Alcatraz. Didn’t remember
to weed the garden,
but the rabbits are kept at bay
by the Thai basil dearden.
The groundskeeper auditions
for a role in Hair next week.
You put in a good word
about his qualifications
after that little poolhouse
jaunt. The burgers
are almost done,
the buns as tight
as that lovely new cabana boy's.

Robert Beveridge makes noise (xterminal.bandcamp.com) and writes poetry in Akron, OH. Recent/upcoming appearances in ZiN Daily, Flash Glass, and Gleam: Journal of the Cadralor, among others.

 
 

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