Last month when Jasper Magazine conducted its First Annual Pint and Poem Walk, a few folks asked for a copy of this poem, so here it is for those who asked (and those who didn’t.) It’s an amusing, odd piece I wrote under the influence of pain medicine after my eardrum ruptured. I was deaf in that ear for nearly a month. Anyway, here goes:
horizontal hold
narcotics kill the pain
my mind a barren pool
rusty ladder descends
into earth and weeds
three lesbians gather wood
together they build a
Frank Lloyd Wright doghouse
monogamy — monotony
one of them is cheating on her husband
i have weird dreams of
my dead father
a fire engine
Leonard Nimoy
and a 19 percent raise
my carpet is the
state fair for roaches
city pigeons die quietly
on my windowsill
heads folded neatly into wings
loose audio tape
lies in a tangled pile
at my feet
i am openly seduced
glistening nude in hues of violet
by a body without a face
amplified pounding
in my head
clock ticking
blood pumping
machine-driven
raucous vacuum
find me, bring me down
where I can feel again
my antenna flails in the wind
please slide on a tennis ball
and help ride me of all this static
— Kristine Hartvigsen
.jpg)