This American Dream Tastes Like Government Cheese
Dear Irreverence,
We were raised on food stamps that looked like British pounds and dead-end jobs where bodies slung over crates and cans and cam shafts or pouches with pennies and coupons and a giant magnet sign wearing the paint off the car was just another insult. This pepperoni’s here for you, America. We wanna be poor. We wanna live off the government, you say. Where in hell does Mr. Government live, I say. Show me the gated drive, let me buzz in a pizza box filled with the greasy process that will take his heart. That’s my message, America, the poor don’t have to do a damn thing to ruin your dreams. You’ll gnash the cheese and constipate yourself. You’ll tell me your work ethic deserves a Sandals vacation. I hate to sweat. I hate humidity. We were raised by swollen feet, the hemorrhages of little numbers for the same hours on earth as you. You think you’re traveling to an island getaway. The palm trees fucking hate you. Remember that. The sun will take your skin the same.
After Being Diagnosed With Celiac Disease
My wife must wash her lips before kissing me: the poison turns me into a balloon on the couch for days: a silhouette of wheat stalk dangerous as the hammer and sickle: disease makes one melodramatic, the weight grain adds to the blood: I’ve been so heavy with thoughts of death: the American goldfinch perches on the window sill, gazes at our family, asking for water in this heatwave: I’ve learned to complain frankly to all the random experts: family, friend, supposed foe: you have no idea what this body says to me when I ignore it: I don’t understand how one can mock pronouns when we know so very little of what happens within our own skin, much less another’s.
