Folktales of Evolution

I didn’t get the memo

to evolve -

stop sticking my hands

into the fresh-fire,

as if some part

of my visceral mania

wants to bloody my knuckles

with the ashes of Prometheus.

Every day that I don’t crash my car

is a white-hot remnant

of the suffocation of boredom,

like my life is on pause

until I’m nose down in a gutter

or in a line that I keep trying to cross.

There’s evaporated acid rain

condensing within every hangover,

each time the sun

rises; I rip down my fingernails

climbing to reach it,

gasping down

at the pulsating impulse

to make something terrifying

out of paper maché

and broken bottles

and bruised ego.

In every grave, there’s an I,

subtly watching

for the apotheosis;

a moment of sickly-yellow violence

igniting once more

any excuse for a fight

for fame,

for a feeling.

2017-2018