#xerxes bumblesea

By Xerxes Bumblesea

’Tis, me thinketh, not un-weird

   that you’re typified, now, by

a Doritos-crumb-filled beard.

   and I hope you know how I

think often of you, brother—

   as does our father, of course,

and, of course, our dear mother.

   I’d phone were I not so hoarse

(yes, my voice has gotten worse).

   and all the letters I send

are returned to me. The curse

   this life is! When will it end?

I know that you share my hope-

   lessness—but I wish you’d shave.

Still, I’ve yet to put a rope

   around my neck. My “man cave”

is a mess, but could be worse.

   And although this life’s a curse,

Lord knows what might await us.

   This world’s not meant to sate us

but to pique our hunger for

    “If you don’t have something nice to say,” saith

Gabriel, “fuck off.” (He seemed to mean it.)

    “I really must insist we ridicule

These people,” Satan rejoined, rejoicing

    In the ailments mad ambition activates oh-so-endlessly,

Let loose in the midst of the disenfranchised; let loose in courtrooms

    Full of microscopes that have been tampered with by the henchmen of

The highest bidder; let loose and pulled tight like a lasso, a noose.

I was there when Francis Bacon pain-

   Ted the Baboon.

(Loved to listen, though his thoughts were all

   Rather naughty.)

Sick and tired, I sired a tick and sent

   It to the moon.

Charm had become a fossil buried

   In my body.

“The Lord’s a vast abstraction: He

   Contains the yet-to-be.”

“God’s never meant that much to me.

   I’ve no theology.

Those doors are locked.”

   “I was there when Jacques

Derrida stalked

   The streets of France,

      And it has made all the différance.”