Aaron Le Mire- Two Poems

Internal Clock

It’s in these moments
the first day of Spring
and your baseball mitt is
broken in
the garage door opening
while you grab your bike
waiting for them to be done with dinner
time between classes and grades
walking off the stage with
your diploma
and your Mom
and Dad
are making their way through
the green grass and heat
and the switchblade
your grandfather gave you
before he died
still rests in your
top drawer
and your flight lands
in some strange town
and you check your
briefcase
you can’t sleep
your wife won’t answer
the kids are in bed
at the hotel bar
you finish a drink
and order another
and another
another.

You realize. Simple.
You’ve never really been alone.

But you are now. And before
you can feel, your next drink comes.

Your tab is coming to an end.

Pumping Tires (you out)

Don’t forget
to remember Lord Tennyson
Ezra and Wordsworth
give a nod to the old
sterile passions told
in eloquent BOLD
dust away mold
Oh! (insert nature and sound)
change word order around
respect is a hole that is dug
in every old boys club

Bukowski did it the best
made art from a whore’s mouth
and the brightest light shone
from the darkest of places
and the words were so common
they passed you on the street
sat next to you on the bus
got you drunk and smoked your weed
so near, you didn’t notice while they
paid for your meal and lent you their coat

they snuck up behind you and slit your
throat.