Childhood like a knife
Childhood, an unwelcome visitor
by lamplit blackmoon
on a frozen carousel
and full of terror
Childhood for a quarter, a pinball replay
an obligatory THRIFTY’S ice cream cone
melting in my hands as I wrap
napkins around it the way
“Little Grandma” taught me
the lazy summers
Walking to Crawford’s Corner
dreading the summer and being shirtless
endless fat boy anxiety about
exposure and being revealed
Nowhere kid with a nowhere mindset
Thick with pillows of pot smoke
Razor gashed arms,
a key burnt into the flesh
Scowled at by an old bat
Who once asked
If his mother had
ever had any kids
that lived suggesting
I was afterbirth, an abortion stain,
because said it deadpan,
pointedly you could feel her venom
it felt ugly
but then again
so did I.
Childhood, the horror novel and comic book escape
Anxiety about Armageddon while
Looking at the sunset, how the red clouds
were always an omen
about a universe unfurled for me
it was something about the colors, mood
and tone of dusk. Sitting in mom’s room
looking out the window, always thinking the end was soon
that it was all going in handbasket more or less
sooner or later, but it was destined
The idea of being with a girl
Immediately made me think of infidelity
–tragic, inexplicable and catastrophic loss
Secret fucking-better fucking
than I could provide
Always the fatboy needledick fears
All of this, of course before
a first kiss ever caressed the mouth
Stained with Hostess® Ding Dongs and fruit pies
And their sweet lies
Childhood, where I picked up the fork
before I picked up the bottle
stuffing stolen candy into the empty heart
throwing up the hoarded food
to assuage the inner child
who knew loss in utero, loss prenuptial,
preconceived with an expiration date
Childhood, I delivered newspapers for spending money
which I spent on snacks and junk and books and music
-pitching wont dreams into the poisoned well
-pushing baskets for snacks and food coma release
Childhood, a rock into an abandoned storefront window
-first time in handcuffs for vandalism—throwing rocks
At the Chrysler dealer arc sodium lamps
Childhood, a memory awash with warmth
Felled by maturity and the staunched blood of adulthood
Responsibility and the shame of not having
Kids and by proxy responsibilities and by proxy
Lifelong attachment to anyone
Childhood, incomplete
A rusty nail or not crossing the vicious creek
By step boulders; I knew I wouldn’t make it
Nor would I survive what awaited
Childhood, inoculated
-Shoplifting and curfew
-Unrequited love as bad and sad as Oscar Wao’s
brief wonderous unfurling
-Simpler times and streetlights
-Little League-lames
-Fat, fucked up and morose
-the terror of a stolen bike
-alley shortcuts
-haunted houses and neighborhood lore
The neighborhood drunk
Was your mentor and sometimes philosopher king
He was buying you a bottle the first time you got arrested
Childhood- Child Hoods:
-lemon fights and rocks at the passing cars
The foreboding of dusk
What lurked inside the pretty girls: friend and foe
Alluring and terrible
What allowances never collected
The nightmare of a locked gate
Absent fathers
Harried worried mothers
Hypocrite role models
Molded rocks
Marching pell mell to the beat of a
Beaten down drummer
Out of step
(get)high school chants were punk anthems
of a new tomorrow
There’s no place like home
There’s no place like home
There’s no place like home
There’s no place like home
(so where am i?)
Circa 2015. East of Los Angeles.
Date of first publication: 11 December 2023
Difficult To Cure 
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