The main complication
will likely be
the bagel table.
Nobody is going to want
a bagel with lox or roe,
I’m guaranteeing that.
This isn’t even
a smoked salmon crowd.
They’d get more of a kick
out of pizza or some other
typical American
fattening agent.
I should have put garlic up my sleeve.
You never know if a vampire’s planning
to try some funny business
with ruby port and a corkscrew.
I won’t worry too much about undead daemons
taking my blood, at least not
as much as I would worry about a chicken
lopping my head off with a cleaver
and serving me with a side salad
[after miraculously gaining the upper body
strength and opposable digits necessary
to wield a blunt instrument and prepare
a gourmet meal suitable for a dinner party].
Nothing says “this stinks” like a loaf of cheese bread wedged between the fridge and the wall for no less than 45 minutes, especially if you’re holding it above a hungry mouse’s mouth while it gnaws on its own foot for sustenance.
Not only will the stench overpower you, but the tiny mammal’s startled yip will get the attention of neighboring creatures, all shapes and sizes. Believe it or not, the average American household contains more distinct species than the average American zoo. Of course, you can’t see 99.7% of them at any given time [unless you have a properly-calibrated microscope lying around].
Nervous cretins climbed
up and down all the time,
then grew up
into prideful cretins
concerned with productivity
and saving face
in front of other
nervous cretins
while they destroy
those same trees
they used to hug and name.
Their memory is sparse
when you confront them on it.
Stumpy masses
of twitching atoms
all look alike
from the microscopic stew,
but from up here
they look like trees
with opinions about the audacity
of their neighbors’ garments
or dance routines
spilling into the street
during witching hour
every third Tuesday–satisfied?
It’s all a pack of rumors,
disconnected from the shallow
root systems and designed
to rot away after a few years,
transient, lost by nature.
The morning,
thick with steam,
builds stillness
into bent limbs,
willing them
to stick around
for another few hours,
at least.
Trees stick up
the sky,
pulling ransom
sun rays
to their roots
and
laughing hollow
in their knot holes.
WHARVED 