All Hallow
Loss now a peace I wear like no thank you
I have already taken what you came to offer
though a kind gesture, a hooked finger inside
pried open lips, yes a kind gesture could last
forever somewhere like here.
Come on baby let me take off your skin face
so I can remonstrate your brain
so I can leave the room
so I can ruin meditation for everyone
so I can go away
so I can strangle my own spirit
Often when I’m my own wet deadly choke
I cough into a gourd and hope when it molds
it’ll turn into an air balloon out of here over
any recorded altitude and as soon as nobody
can see me I’ll ignite the reserve gas, tricky
as any other wishing star.
Be a decent boy and twinkle for me twinkle
so as you don’t go right to hell
so as you don’t got to get right
so as you can smile while lying
so as you don’t get broke down
so as you don’t get broken now
Going deeper into the epiglottis then into night
the fleet-footed-cloven-hooved-split-tongued
entity dredged so deeply within me it must have
emerged from me, my fault indeed, once more
I’ve let slip away the thief.
Slip out them wet socks and Benedictine my monk
so I can navigate this mortal coil
so I can indulge collateral
so I can illustrate carnivorous vigor
so I can breathe quick and cry
so I can get drunk on your high
Ice freezes under mud and I’m beside myself
slap happy for a flash flood of graves to form
where the sea settles into a foam of sludge,
bomb-blinded mucous eyes try to find a slice
of sunset to witness, a pleasure in forgoing
each iota before any sum whole.
Spread your wings and look away from me
so as you can slip seeds between floorboards
so as you can tell EMTs what you took
so as you don’t lock yourself in this room
so as you can hunt a smaller animal
so as you can encourage reincarnation
Bring me to walnut groves and the bone pit
composed of cattle femurs you once hoped
were dinosaur bones before seeing a bloated
heifer decaying there, brown seepage leaked
upon a perforated bed of bleached calcium,
pragmatic lack of mythical levity.
I know you want a nip of my damp lobotomy
so I can close your cold eyelids
so I can hone my foul sorcery
so I can find some Narcan
so I can walk the old family dog
so I can mend any hexes broken
Sick with incandescent plasma with patience
await zomboid cross-contamination although
it’d feel nice to get out again, swallow helium
pregame for the end of the inhabitable Earth
where ruling class germs can radiate tenderly
in recurring diluvial residue.
Show me how to enter your dwelling undetected
so as you may assure paranoia
so as you live in constant danger
so as you have the time to worry
so as you pass your last limit
so as you can lean on never again
Loneliness is less when I’m off by myself
like an ornery crab in the claw machine tank
but I try to quell the tide and see your faces
though grief is a thing that takes away reflections
and leaves shadows in the air, forms with lost
function in an effort to hang on.
so as I am grub on concrete after heavy rain
so you are heat waves which arrange decay
(The Columbia Review Vol. 106, Issue 2)
poems by nicholas alti 