issue68corrodedarteries

                                   ZYGOTE IN MY COFFEE.COM

***BIO*** Michele McDannold: I’m 31, live in a small town in Illinois. I like Marlboro Red cigarettes, Millstone coffee, blue lights, good music, food I don’t have to cook myself and writing poetry. My poems have been or will be at The Indite Circle, Remark, Lunatic Chameleon, Cherry Bleeds and Zygote.

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Corroded Arteries

by Michele McDannold

I swear it;
Momma sucked on Hitler
under the Christmas tree.
I saw it;
He was grinnin’ from
knob to nose hair
under the twinkly lights.

I would have missed it all,
if it hadn’t been for Grandma.
It started with the
usual Carol Burnett,
and the ear...
always the yanking
of that ear.
Then, on to the good stuff.

I think it was that movie
with Dennis Hopper.
The one with the vagina rape,
that glass bottle thing.
At least, I think it was Dennis.
Or maybe it was that
scar-faced guy,
with the people at the end of the street,
or the top of the hill.

Whichever it is,
they were having sex on the beach...
and rubber boats filled with
marijuana,
the cliffs—
there were sacrifices
of virgins to great stone gods.
I got the horror flicks
and the B, sex-pot movies
of the 80s
smooshed together
like meringue pie
and saran wrap.

Late nights with Johnny had
not quite prepared me
for this evening’s show.
Though, Ed McMahon laughing
always sounded a bit like
Satan coming.

Oct. 2006