don’t know how you keep your cool—seems like you’ve thought about this; but, when you do, in my experience, you get nervous. we’re going, hot mama, to bring this country down (as if you need my help) and, when we do, i’ll be sure to vote, naturally, for you.
Silly, so silly, this is all about me; i’m just talking to myself, in a foreign country. Daddy thinks i’ll get arrested—or sued for all I’m worth; so i use code names to keep this about the planet earth.

wasting away at the corners, hemmed up
running out of money, hatred in my cup
thinking devil be darned, don’t want to swear
thinking back on the good times, if you care

hey, party-man, pretty boy in plaid, this is the lone ranger, dressing up in drag; you want to be a woman? not exact-ly that—but, on occasion, yeah, if it helps me shut my trap.

Tonto, my injun, on the horizon:
kind of hard to see—riding due west—
what does love say? in from the cold?
Always be good, and always do your best

my true love is spilling out at the seams
my ambition, for her, reeks like perfume
applied, do tell, to cover up the smoke
a past that sucks up what’s left in the room

This sprawling, feverish poem reads like a consciousness trying to outrun itself. The speaker swings between self-loathing, swagger, humor, spiritual exhaustion, and sudden tenderness, creating a voice that feels unstable but intensely alive. Lines such as “the sound i hear is a phone that won’t ring” compress loneliness into a brutally ordinary image, while “approaching mathematical perfection; my love is crazy as fuck” captures the poem’s collision between intellect and emotional chaos. The work’s power comes from its refusal to settle into one tone: vulgarity sits beside lyricism, despair beside absurd comedy. References to “the underclass,” “heroes,” and “justice for the shunned” suggest a wider social vision beneath the personal unraveling. Readers drawn to raw, unfiltered psychological poetry would find this difficult to forget.

This piece reads like a furious jazz improvisation performed at the edge of social collapse. Its power comes from the collision of raw confession, political outrage, grotesque humor, and sudden vulnerability. The structure is deliberately fractured: long prose-like bursts give way to tighter rhymed stanzas, creating a rhythm that feels unstable but intensely alive. Lines such as “the enemy within, dear friend, is the enemy without” show the poem’s ability to turn inward conflict into cultural critique, while images like “Satan sits / a dollop of mayonnaise in his ice cream” reveal a surreal comic imagination beneath the anger. The frequent shifts in voice and tone mimic a spiraling consciousness trying to hold itself together through language. What makes the poem compelling is not polish, but velocity—the sense that every line risks losing control yet somehow lands with force.

Emotional survival is paramount in this chaotic inner monologue that shifts between confession and attack. The poem moves from violent and surreal images—“sniper among us,” “roasting a pig,” “Pervitin cockpit”—to deeply personal reflections about aging, regret, institutional mistreatment, and isolation. A recurring tension runs through the work: the desire to connect battling against self-loathing and distrust of others. The narrator imagines alternate lives (“if I’d gotten off the sauce”), struggles with compulsive behavior, and lashes out at society while also pleading for understanding. References to politics, mental illness, addiction, romance, and masculine insecurity collide into a restless psychological landscape. The result is a raw portrait of someone trying to hold onto their identity and their dignity while feeling spiritually cornered by modern life.

This sprawling poetic sequence blends political rage, loneliness, masculinity, fantasy, and cultural decay into a surreal inner monologue spoken by a narrator who feels both trapped inside society and strangely elevated above it. Moving between satire and confession, the poem attacks racism, political extremism, media obsession, and the empty pursuit of power while also revealing a desperate longing for love, meaning, and human connection. Lines such as “the fire is alive and it cannot stop” and “living in a nutshell—His infinite sky” create a prophetic, unstable atmosphere in which personal breakdown and national collapse seem inseparable. The speaker drifts through visions of future power, failed relationships, addiction, and isolation, yet remains darkly funny and self-aware. The result is a chaotic but compelling portrait of a mind trying to survive modern America without surrendering its imagination.