MIKE YOUNG









One Last Note or Two or Wet

 

Thunder scoots against the riffs

that eke from such a dimebag balcony.

 

      He plays to prove his t-shirt,

      its logash logo of The Doors.

 

            In his family, things are assumed fucked

            when you spring for the pre-slated motorcycle.

 

But he tried and couldn't swing a cut & paste account

of "first in the family to graduate x" —

 

not a neat forked choice, just a skylark plunge

for "volunteer jawbones on the Reception Battalion bus" :

 

            comparing pink neon and cornpoke routes

            against his hopalong mytholojerk,

 

            a clank heart and that later go! crokd fingr

            trigger flang scuzz thud finger but oh now just

 

skin that bathed in the kitchen sink (no flowers

near the shower knob, all nickel hussy Mazda gurgle—)

 

      He has seen Val Kilmer fake peyote bolstered cum

      and dreamed to jump hard from his own face,

 

is worried now about a fumbled twang,

losing sweet ass riff shit to wet strings

 

kinked and fried (what is it one-mississippi two-mm)

by a rain that you can lean from or let spread.

 

      He tries to keep the guitar under the roof slats

      and knees the amp against his goof flesh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Beloved Floofylimbs, How I Pine Like Da!mn

 

Floofylimbs, I live in a cheery house of rafts,

wherein I dwell on sex and speaker systems,

all the livelong whistlin' "shlam-zee-du!"

and "up with methsicles!"

 

I make sure to reck for heavy heavy siphoning,

and eat my grilled tomatoes from a can:

a tin assembly stapled by a Persian

lacking ankle socks.

 

Charlie from the DragonCon insists I scrimp,

owing to my debt of twenty Pogs. But hark!

All day the pitbulls squish the avocados,

all day a real bridge is paced

 

to grind away through clomps

the limpid bargains of frayed caps or county lines.

Yet I never dally in such onion-ridden frowns: every

eye I own is totally into that Kenny Chesney nostalgia.

 

What's with tongue aflame with shitty shitty bang bang?

We have a world of Specials, of Extravaganzas, of Megaman!

Why, Tim has stayed up all night selling fish in Everquest and

truly so did all the garden jingle at his feat! No powdered eggs!

 

So prowl with me through the Raley's parking lot, the bumper cars, and

train your spork to slice the scrim. For I did not buy half a dozen

Gatorades to see your rain shoes near the oven. This is the year

that we — like — yeah, the year — you know — help?















Mike Young lives in Ashland, Oregon with empty cans of orange-scented air freshener. He co-edits NOÖ Journal and the West Wind Review. His stories and poems have or will appear in Pindeldyboz, Opium Magazine .print, Juked Print #4, elimae, The 2River View, Wordriot and whatnot. He maintains a blog (http://noojournal.com/blog) and mends plantains.




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