Aidan Rooney-Cespedes
Skunk
1
Two nights ago I crossed a skunk,
suburbia’s disaffected punk,
lumbering off beneath a bush.
All I could do, of course, was wish
he’d wish me well, pass on, and think
quietly how much my life must stink
this lamp-lit, weed-spiced night. My tank-
-top’s soaked, I suck wind like a fish;
tonight’s
too close a night for pulling rank
on dudes like me, barely fit to crank
it home to air-conditioned house,
wrap-round deck and satellite dish.
I’d all my lucky stars to thank
two nights ago.
2
Tonight, less so. Once more, I’ve drunk
my prophylactic dose of plonk
with supper, enough to polish
off a ripe, blue, denigrated cheese,
beget the now familiar funk
that sends me off around the block.
I’m out for a run again, sunk
in idle dreams. Not that I’d wish
to, nights
like this, run some place else, relinq-
-uish these fumes that suddenly rank
my dark with his. Like a dervish,
I swerve off-road, his bitterness
the pause to think that life off-sync
two nights ago,
tonight’s less so.
Page(s) 56-57
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