Beauty is Imperfection

My head and pencil neck

                Hang longingly over the

                Syringe-like highway dividing lines

Speeding past; morphine

                Nightmares; an ominous windshield

 

I’ve been wearing black

                Socks in the morning

                The coffee I cuddled

In my tonsils

Gropes around

                Like the failure of alcohol

 

I’m going on furlough up north

Up away from pedestrians

                And pederasts,

Just above the street corner

                Cymbal music, a cut

                Above the freon suffocation

 

To the fake pastoral fields

                Away from my siblings

                Away from the church

To the fake pastoral fences

In a car with a passenger

                I don’t know

                Away to anywhere

 

I took the white hot pills

To ensure that before I reached

My destination I would not fall

Asleep on the road, killing us both

 

But this time they made

                Me ache; as my foot

                Dips into the combustion

 

I squeeze my eyes

                I’m awake and more in pain

                And acutely aware

That I’m as fragile as glass.

 

–Eric Rasmussen, 1990