Then I did my impression of a drag queen
impersonating Ed Sullivan singing T. Rex.
Unsurprisingly, it didn’t go over.
What a lousy Thanksgiving.
Everyone wanted to ‘do yoga.’
But asking Middle-Class white people
to take up space seems redundant.
Did I make it into the middle class? Nope.
I had to borrow money from them to declare bankruptcy.
If they approach you, keep everything but your tears.
We put on Ella Fitzgerald and the trees go wild.
Here even grass attacks (slowly).
I confess to worshipping the nightingale, among others.
At times all culture seems a pantomime fronting a great evil.
Physicists say that time in this universe is red.
Their cigars smell of dust.
The mystery of the kitchen is like the dream of an angel.
Some of these spices induce inactivity.
Some speak directly to the poisoned soul.
We catch a glimpse of the reality we are about to enter.
Everything looks like a cartoon but it’s the right place.
They say it’s easier if you have a teaspoon.
They say the machine restores itself.
Walk with me toward new prayer opportunities.
We are too high to find your coat.
It takes time to get comfortable with your minimum.
You’re doing great shrub by shrub.
It’s called ‘the partridge of meditating.’
The people on this street are as interesting as anyone.
Or we could just get in the Trans Am.
The path to god, whispers a little sparrow.
John Colburn
John Colburn is the author of Invisible Daughter (firthFORTH Books, 2013), Psychedelic Norway (Coffee House Press, 2013), dear corpse (Spuyten Duyvil, 2018), and unabandonment (Spuyten Duyvil, 2021) as well as four chapbooks of poetry. He lives in St. Paul, MN, and is one of the publishers/editors in the Spout Press collective.
