Author: iainthomas

They found the bodies of 800 babies

In a septic tank at an Irish home for unwed mothers

Their only gravestone was

A news story in the Washington Post

No word on whether or not

A fog of last breaths

Lit the air each morning

Seeping out of the wet ground

Something read over morning coffee

And I cannot help but think

I said the words “starlit distant ocean”

In a memorial poem for my wife’s mother

And I said the words “How dare you pity this man?”

In my father’s eulogy

And I said a thousand, thousand things about other things

But I would struggle to say the 800 words that each one

Must have had

As a name.

It’s fine.

 

Maybe you can make it ironic.

Something that feels like a girl in a short skirt at a party.

Offending her sensibilities with her own humour.

Daring you to love her and playing never-to-get.

Pretend there’s a joke that only her and the people who like the poem know.

Wink.

 

Maybe you can make it angry.

And tell a story of how how strong your mother was.

She raised you all on her own.

Or how drunk your father was.

Act like you were born on railroad tracks.

Maybe your father was a train.

Get someone to play an 808 in the background.

 

Maybe you can put it in the middle of the road.

Pontificate a little.

Become a vanilla paste of words.

Don’t say anything really.

Wonder about the nature of a pen.

Be clever.

 

Maybe you can make it impenetrable.

Be as vague as possible.

Slam your fist into a grapefruit and make a kind of growling noise.

Roll your eyes as soon as someone asks you what it means.

Snap your fingers to show you don’t understand.

Wear a beret.

 

Maybe you can make it a history lesson.

Talk about the plants and leaves that grew around you.

Tell me something about a smell you remember from a kitchen.

Shock me with some kind brutality either inflicted or received or witnessed.

Write one of the words in a language I don’t understand.

Put it in italics.

 

Maybe you can make it real sensitive.

Write words that kiss the skin.

Make them sound like the space between two drum beats.

Talk about what it feels like to breathe.

Or something.

 

Who cares.

Because poetry is the only art form that people naturally expect to be,

shit.

So it’s ok to write shit poetry.

 

It’s fine.

 

Most other people smile with all the sincerity of trend forecasters.

Most encourage others softly, like with a retweet of something they said five days ago.

Most hope their lives with be shared, like an exciting link to something that no one would believe.

I’m happier than them all though, because I kiss my wife like a running shoe commercial.

 

It’s been a while

But I still remember the way

Your brother turned away

At the funeral

As if there was somewhere to look

That didn’t hurt.

“If you make me sick, please don’t make me better”

Is a bumper sticker, you would do well in the bumper sticker industry

You could become head of bumper sticker technology

And one day, while you’re all laughing at the water cooler

At your jobs at the bumper sticker factory

You’ll turn to the guy next to you, drinking coffee

In your striped and collared shirts

Laughing, slapping each other’s backs and one of

You, one of you will say

“You know, I bet many people scream with their last breath

‘I’ll tell the truth tomorrow.'”

And all of you will entirely deserve the awkward silence that follows.

Cochise by Audioslave blares across the crowd 

As I 

Step into the auditorium and the crowd goes insane 

And the fireworks explode almost setting my moleskin on fire 

As a

Kid waves a banner that reads “New Sincerity For Life” with a picture of Daniel Johnston below it

And nearly starts a fight with another kid with a shirt that reads “Detached Irony Will DESTROY YOU”

As a

Man wearing a David Foster Wallace shirt with the entire

“The next real literary “rebels” in this country might well emerge as some weird bunch of anti-rebels, born oglers who dare somehow to back away from ironic watching, who have the childish gall actually to endorse and instantiate single-entendre principles. Who treat of plain old untrendy human troubles and emotions in U.S. life with reverence and conviction. Who eschew self-consciousness and hip fatigue. These anti-rebels would be outdated, of course, before they even started. Dead on the page. Too sincere. Clearly repressed. Backward, quaint, naive, anachronistic. Maybe that’ll be the point. Maybe that’s why they’ll be the next real rebels. Real rebels, as far as I can see, risk disapproval. The old postmodern insurgents risked the gasp and squeal: shock, disgust, outrage, censorship, accusations of socialism, anarchism, nihilism. Today’s risks are different. The new rebels might be artists willing to risk the yawn, the rolled eyes, the cool smile, the nudged ribs, the parody of gifted ironists, the “Oh how banal.” To risk accusations of sentimentality, melodrama. Of overcredulity. Of softness. Of willingness to be suckered by a world of lurkers and starers who fear gaze and ridicule above imprisonment without law. Who knows.” 

Quote on it spits on a deconstructionist dressed like a young William S. Burroughs

As I 

Get to the ring, another writer enters, clad in his spandex uniform, to the tune of “Banana Phone”

And he grabs the mic out of the referee’s hand and screams, all up in my face, 

“Nothing has meaning, nothing is safe, especially not youuuuuuu.” and he flexes his arm in my direction 

As I 

Snatch the mic out of his hand and push him down on the ground and say 

“Pleasefindthis did not come to Smackdown to talk, Pleasefindthis came to Smackdown to show you that everything has meaning, that every heartbeat is beautiful, that irony offers nothing but cynicism and that that way, lies death.”

 “OH SNAP!” yells some Kerouac fan yells before descending into stream of conscious gibberish.

As the 

Fight begins in earnest. 

 

 

 

 

You will not lose weight with this one weird old tip.

You will not meet singles in your area.

A little girl with cancer was not saved by an injection of the HIV/AIDS virus.

Beyonce is not fucking the president.

Other people do not hate him.

You will not win a free iPad.

You are not the one millionth viewer of this website.

None of these 12 movies that were nearly made would’ve been good.

Your computer is not running slow.

You can’t make this much money from home.

15 minutes is not all you need.

What’s on your mind isn’t worth posting.

No one is giving away free watches.

You will need your credit card.

This will not improve your life, right now.

This is not something you can do today to make people like you.

There is no miracle food.

Stop looking at pictures of fat celebrities.

The world is beautiful but the people who live in it will lie to you.

Live with truth and meaning and don’t be distracted by anything else.

 

Dad,

I touched your face one

Last time in the funeral home

And I’ve never touched anything

So cold in my life

And my first thought was

“At least you aren’t suffering from the heat”

And you taught me to try and laugh at everything

That hurt

No matter what it was

Because that way it didn’t hurt so much.

Dad,

Mom’s ok

I wrote you a letter

And put it in the coffin

And it said “I’ll take care of mom”

And I meant that.

 

Dad,

Mom phoned and said

That you didn’t wake up

And I’m sorry about that

My first instinct was to to call you

And ask you what I should do

And tell you, I don’t know why I should do anything

Anymore

Because there’s no one left to impress.