A ROACH LIFE
By TOM MILLER



you get it into your head
it goes something like this:
"i'm not going to make it.
the whole thing's a sham."


you're there in the bar
drinking a fancy drink
mostly mixer
but you act like it's
all gin


you slur your worrrrds


pretend the lady sitting next to you
is somebody you're permitted to talk with


move over to where she's sitting
she's drinking gin
straight gin


"hi," you say
it's feeble
pathetic


"hi yourself," she replies.
it's angels calling from the
heavens-- she and her gin--
she's tougher than you


she can take it


"my name is frank.
what's your name?" you ask.
you ask sincerely


"why?" she says.


you're baffled
you don't know why


you don't know if you
want to screw her or
get into her head to
see how she works


and if it's to see how she
works it feels all fake
even if it isn't


even if it's real
that's what you get


"because," you continue
"because i'd like to meet you."


"what for?" she replies.
"who are you that i should meet you?
Especially in this place. who would
i ever want to meet in this place?"


you counter,
"not everybody here is an asshole.
some of us are sincere and decent."


then
you remember your last visit
to the SHADY BAR


you ordered a PINK VIRGIN
a concoction made from cream
peach schnapps and a cherry


you sat in the same seat
talking to an ugly woman with
a busted lip and three teeth


her tit was hanging out of her
dirty bra it had brown around
the nipple like someone had had
her tit up the ass


but with all the PINK VIRGINS
you had had that night she looked like
a perfect princess like the high
school prom queen-- the one who told
you you had a face like a sidewalk


and you said,
"what's your name?"


she looked at you as if
maybe
she might at least
suck your dick in the toilet
stall and swallow but instead


she said, "get away from me,
you white nigger!"


she moved away from you and
went with the guy with the oil
in his hair and four teeth


her kind


they made it together
somewhere so you could see it


you watched them suck each other's
lips like animals at the zoo they
drooled and tongues darted in and
out of places that haven't seen a
toothbrush in weeks


you thought about bacteria and
leeches death and crabs


you became erect and envious


they couldn't make enough
PINK VIRGINS to put you
out of this hell but you
ordered another one just the same


this time
you couldn't taste the peach
but you didn't care


it was over


the people
all have faces
like they were cut out
of magazines


those are the pretty ones


others have it like
sand blasted sphinxes
old and weathered and old


those are the ones that
make it


possessing the beautiful
like collectors of antiquity


polishing and nurturing and
admiring their expensive prizes


you're not the one


it's that way every night
but you keep coming back like
chicken pox or herpes


the same old you
but you get better


you survive the poison
adapt to it


make food out of it


poison becomes nutrition
roaches lunching on
nerve gas


spray me
spray me


i love it


you try a compliment


they tell you
in the books about how to meet
that special someone they tell you
to compliment something about them


compliment a piece of jewelry
compliment the eyes; so poetic
compliment anything at all


women like to be complimented
and why shouldn't they


anyone who spends so many hours
in the bathroom putting on
the makeup and the fragrance
and the hairspray and the powder
and the lip gloss and the tampon
and the nail polish and the
accessories and the hair color
and the mouthwash and the
eye liner and the deodorant
and the girdle and the lift bra
and the pantyhose on the shaven
legs of summer


you might as well approach
a beautiful woman at the bar
and say, "what are you, a
yeti? what have you done to
yourself? you look like an
oil painting that hasn't dried."


but men admire the work ethic
look at the time she took
to hide herself and become
this advertisement


i want one
i would pay for one
so instead you say,


"nice eyes," or
"nice hair," or
"you smell nice" or
"lovely earrings," or
"a body like yours
shouldn't be ruined by
a dress even if it is
ralph lauren."


why don't we instead
go up to these women and tell
the truth


"listen bitch, you can throw
all the makeup and jewelry
and fashion design in your
cheap budget on your gangly frame
but let's face it


i want to stuff my
hose in your yank!"


this line never gets a man laid
but at least it's honest


so you go for the compliment
let's say it's earnest


let's say you say,
"god, you're beautiful.


if you were an island
i'd want to be stranded on you


if you were a jail
I'd want to be imprisoned in you


if you were a rainbow
i'd be your storm."


but the truth is
you want to grind your pole
in her clam until you
shoot your ratty juice
and then


isn't it true;
she's the last thing you'd like
to see in your bed in the
morning?


sure.


you'd wake up
peel the sheets away from
the dried cum on your stomach


turn to her
looking at the crust
at the corner of her lips


the crust in her eyes
the crust at her dusty snatch


look at the blotch of blood
in the center of the sheets
and say to yourself,


"i should have fed the octopus
in my salt water tank." but
maybe you had her for her mind.


yes
her mind


her mind


she wakes up


"where am i? who are you?
O god, no. i really need
to go. O god, why? Why did
i... what am i doing here...
my boyfriend's going to
kill me..." etc. etc.


you make her a boiled egg


she doesn't eat it


she throws on her clothing
and heads out of your
nasty little home as fast
as her cinderella feet can
carry her


and you eat the egg
you wash the sheet because
you know you don't want to
sleep in that smell


that smell that seems
to last for days


you find a personal
vaginal napkin in the trashcan
in the bathroom and there's
a white viscous fluid involved


she goes home to her boyfriend
they make passionate love
he gets your cum on his dick
and she bleeds on his bed too


meantime
you add lots of bleach to the laundry
and gag on the egg and call your mother
with whom you haven't spoken in years


"mom, hi. it's me, frank."


"frank? frank who?"


"your son, ma. i love you."


"who is this?" - click -


you'll be back at the bar
won't you


sure you will


you'll be drinking PINK VIRGINS
and looking at the beautiful people


you'll desire them


you'll imagine a life
where everything goes according
to the best movies you ever saw


you'll think about kissing
clean, clinical and germ free


you'll make passionate love and
there will be no blood, no yeast,
no inappropriate fluids


you'll get a house on a hill
with a white picket fence


you'll communicate and grow
and learn and prosper


you'll have children
one boy and one girl
and they'll be perfect little children


they'll go to school and become
a doctor and a lawyer


they'll drive nice cars
you'll sit on the porch swing with
your wife and while away the days


she'll knit a sweater and you'll
carve a piece of wood into a monkey


yes


that's what will happen


yes


sure it will




this is it and that's all there is


drink a few beers
watch the video play
listen to classical music


and this is it
there's nothing more to it


why bother
feeling what someone else
is feeling




clock tick tick


numbers go by
counting the moments
that can never be
remembered


the way they were


not in paintings
poems or
stories told in some
library to a bunch of
stoned kids dying to
get out of there and
back to the canal where
the fish are legendary


triumphs


they drop their lines
and wait


wait watching the water
go by




poem after poem


you can type it
in a hurry


that doesn't make
a poem bad


per se


no and sometimes
it makes a poem better


to just
spill it out


like soup and cum and
gasoline


there can be power
in a poem


written in a hurry




call the medics -- it could be the end


in the middle of a poem
he clutched his heart


reached over to the phone and
dialed 911


emergency! emergency!
the poet has done something important!


of course they arrive
several hours late


and the poet is dead
and the poem has become


smudged out in the blood




3 poems for 3 people


1: you are worthless
kill yourself
save air for people
that matter


2: heard you died recently
don't tell anyone or they
might make a big deal
about it


3: sometimes i think
about what it means
to be alive and sometimes
i think about what it means
to be dead


i suppose
either one will do



courage in the face of destiny


i put a flask of sake in the microwave
forty-five seconds


and as the sake warmed
i noticed an ant crawling around


i thought
he's going to fry and i watched


like a guard at the
halocaust


forty-five seconds later
the ant was still crawling around


i had a certain admiration
for his courage as i pulled out


the sake flask and
crushed the ant with my finger



this writing will get me nowhere


i imagine
in a dream of sorts
that someone will bail me out


say something like
he's good or maybe
he's great


on a stage
they'll gather around
to hear me read
poems i've written


but the dream
turns sour


the audience boos
and leaves


then there's nothing left
but me on the stage
under the lights


then the lights go out



there must be someone


out there
i walk the streets
watch my shadow
dance


from wall to
wall


across the bushes
pirouettes over the grass
the most beautiful thing
in the moonlight


sometimes
i see the whole body
alive with darkness


other times
spinning off into
blackness


blackness in
black


invisible


this is my love



terracotta floors


3:39 a.m.


typing into this monster
screen


letters
on a board
like a typewriter
only modern


i can talk with anybody
in the world if
if so desire


who has a computer
like i do


but for those who don't
i'll may never know them
just as i may never know


the deep tiny lines
in the terracotta floors
only a microscope can
show me


i don't own a microscope
some don't own computers
and some


will never know
the deep tiny lines



skeleton face


my friend
has a skull
in his file cabinet


we look at it
on occasion
and often laugh


it could have been
someone important or
maybe just another
jerk


like so many people
i know who are alive
with flesh on their heads


but they'll all end up
like this


and
if they're lucky


they'll end up
in a file cabinet
where somebody might
look at them and
on occasion
laugh


instead of
underground where
nobody laughs or
cries or


anything



march 3rd


if people talk
i can't hear them
now


everything is quiet
except for the humming
of the computer


outside
moisture is forming on the
grass in diamond beads


clouds move by
quietly


clouds always move by
quietly


this is march 3rd


something may happen
to make this date matter


i'll know tomorrow
when i read the newspaper


it will most likely be
a death that will make
march 3rd matter


somebody famous perhaps
or maybe somebody who
doesn't matter at all



help me


sometimes
i ask for help


i ask into the air
to no one in particular


i say,
"help me. please, help."


then i cry
like an actor cries


fake tears
sometimes it seems


i feel
retarded


drink my beer in gulps
mad gulps


eat some pill
any pill


then life becomes smooth
smooth, so far...


not death or
sickness


more like comedy
and i laugh


fake laugh


laugh like a kid
who doesn't know what's coming



father


i've written a few poems about my father and i'm not sure why
because he was a sort of worthless drunk wishywashy guy-- not
much of a man-- i'll tell you a story-- i was in the back seat
of the car and i couldn't have been more than 14 years old-- and
mom was in the passenger seat-- we were on our way to disney
world-- and i saw my mom reach over with her hand-- and i saw
my father reach over with his hand-- and they interlocked their
pinky fingers-- and i looked at the two of them with their pinky
fingers interlocked and thought, "christ, how pathetic!"-- but of
course i didn't say anything-- i was much more excited about going
to disney world and going down main street to the magic shop where
i would make my father buy me a magic trick that turns quarters
into dimes-- and when we got there that's exactly what i did--
and the trick cost twenty-five dollars and after i read the
instructions i asked my father for a quarter and he gave it to me
and i put it into the magical box and waved my arm and abracadabra
the quarter turned into a dime that i gave back to my father
who said, "how about that!" and put the dime in his pocket and i
pocketed the quarter and used it later to buy candy-- i always
bought candy which ended up rotting my teeth and costing over
eight-hundred dollars to pull out of my face-- but i'll never forget
my father and the time we went to the movies and in the middle of
a big action sequence he said he had to go to the bathroom and i
waited and waited for him to come back-- and when he didn't come
back i went out of the theater to look for him and found him in
the bar next door drunk again on martinis.


i cried because we always shammed each other even though we loved
each other.


that's when i was 14 but i know better now. he's dead and i'm an
alcoholic.



sleep & dream


the old world
disappears
and a new one
emerges


rainbow colors
naked jaunts
around the block
the neighbors wave
hello


you fuck the
dog down the street
and the girl scout
and the alter boy


then you fly
on the roof of the
gas station and
spit fire until the
sheriff shoots you
down


but the bullets go
through you and you
laugh


scream and laugh
and cry


fly off
into a tornado and
die 3 maybe 4 times


your powers weaken
you fall into the snow


you think about santa
santa clause at the mall


marriage and
strap-on eleven inch
cocks


and lipstick


smiling when you're angry
for the camera


the money and the
glory


money and the
glory


money and the
glory


O lawdy O lawd


she is standing there
her arms outstretched


tears and mouth
tits and heart


her arms outstretched
she reaches for you


reaches for
anything you can give her


but what can you give her
that matters?


the sound of gunfire as
black birds scatter
into the wind