Foul Vowel

Sometimes

There’s a doldrum hum that comes to find me lost someplace in sums of lines–

Some written, some spoken.

Some have woken me from sleep.

Others have been too cheap to write, others too wrong.

They creep–my wrongs.

They seep through all that’s gold like litter,

Defacing truths.

Making my lips taste more insulting.

Bitter furrows, relentless headaches,

Takes and retakes and takes and retakes

Resulting in takes and retakes

Of mistakes done replayed

I’m faced then defaced by mistakes I redo.

What’s new though, what’s true though?

No how are you? Just fuck you. You probably did those mistakes. What were they?

Did I say mistakes? Well, how bout these now?

Did you like those well try these now.

Bitter lows, unyielding fake highs

To make everyone think I won’t do it.

One last mistake.

Maybe that’s why I haven’t written, because it’s one of the last things I did write.

Not making a mistake was the last thing I did right.

Did you hear why?

Somewhere nearby there was a yelp–

Some far-off cry. Something no one else could hear.

Something about last year or the year before. I can’t keep it together,

You know how these things go. I can’t remember whether that heap

That sheep

That leap of faith is broken–

That creep that said something or other or did something or other.

That steep

cliff.

He went off the deep-end.

And maybe I did too. Or maybe I was close. Or maybe I wasn’t. Amazon had a sale on weight equipment today.

Get it? Weight equipment. Maybe not today.

Maybe tomorrow. Maybe not. Probably not. No, I won’t. Stop worrying. Really. Ya basta. I’m not that stupid. But I have been known to make mistakes.

There’s that humming again.

How are you? Have you tried this chicken?

DG Valles