The Front Steps in Summer
This is not a rail you can roll on
This is not a trail you can follow on
Here he comes with his hard-on
Saying "ain't she lovely?"
Made of harder stuff (standard issue)
Did he blow his brains in a tissue?
Tell yourself that we miss you
‘Cause you will not hear it here.
Who's that pushing my sister down?
Whose breath smells like a baby's frown?
Dead men talk when you're not around
A loaded shovel, and someone's goat is got.
The imagined pulse of a nation
Passing off the French as the Haitian
There's no funner vacation
Than a mirror image.
All those ground-up bones in the pavement
Hallelujah! What have they really meant?
When tattle-taling is flagrant
There's your pinky-ring convention.
Crosshairs stacked, grinning chin to ear
Napalm sweats and the fear of fear
One hand gropes while the other steers
A warm December, and someone's goat is got.
Devils poke at your shoulder
No one else can see them
But we all know they're there
Death makes everything colder
Even you.
If the teat is swollen, you milk it
If the head's too hard, well, you hit it
Suffering weaknesses kill it
Isn't this your m.o.?
Though you're living up to your surname --
How will young ones fend in a hurricane? --
Your greasy heart's just a big stain
In a tomb of crushed right angles.
Wash those hands where the sun don't shine
There's too much blood in your bleak bloodline
This is apt almost all the time
A fit of wisdom, and someone's goat is got.
© 1998 John Brocato
This is not a trail you can follow on
Here he comes with his hard-on
Saying "ain't she lovely?"
Made of harder stuff (standard issue)
Did he blow his brains in a tissue?
Tell yourself that we miss you
‘Cause you will not hear it here.
Who's that pushing my sister down?
Whose breath smells like a baby's frown?
Dead men talk when you're not around
A loaded shovel, and someone's goat is got.
The imagined pulse of a nation
Passing off the French as the Haitian
There's no funner vacation
Than a mirror image.
All those ground-up bones in the pavement
Hallelujah! What have they really meant?
When tattle-taling is flagrant
There's your pinky-ring convention.
Crosshairs stacked, grinning chin to ear
Napalm sweats and the fear of fear
One hand gropes while the other steers
A warm December, and someone's goat is got.
Devils poke at your shoulder
No one else can see them
But we all know they're there
Death makes everything colder
Even you.
If the teat is swollen, you milk it
If the head's too hard, well, you hit it
Suffering weaknesses kill it
Isn't this your m.o.?
Though you're living up to your surname --
How will young ones fend in a hurricane? --
Your greasy heart's just a big stain
In a tomb of crushed right angles.
Wash those hands where the sun don't shine
There's too much blood in your bleak bloodline
This is apt almost all the time
A fit of wisdom, and someone's goat is got.
© 1998 John Brocato