‘A Case for Mondays’

I try my best

to push time through my pen,

working through phrases

in my driveway

outside my place,

hungry and afraid

to pull the handle.

If I collapse into my couch,

watching Scandal

or some other neutered Netflix series

passing itself off as intellectual

with covert political intentions,

I’ll never be mentioned

in a sentence

with art.

I do feel stolen from—

minutes mugged,

so I lock the driver’s side

and glance between mirrors.

Seeing nothing but my face,

I put the car in neutral,

rolling back

down the hill

and over the sidewalk.

Lost,

another series

going nowhere.

Praying for a T-bone,

I hit the brakes,

screaming in Soprano—

mistakes and mishaps—

and the scene goes black.

It’s red meat on Monday,

and my lady waits.

We don’t watch TV

anymore—it’s not in vogue.

We don’t read magazines—

coffee table propaganda.

We break stanzas,

sharing this pen,

dripping ink

like a Rorschach test,

and we find elephants

standing in the room with us.

Writing and rhyming,

reading between ivory tusks,

never forgetting

to waggle our trunks.

It’s an oasis,

and the world’s parched,

cracking lips

like risen starch,

and we don’t eat carbs

much

on Mondays.

That’s for Tuesdays,

when we eat baguette

and rewatch House of Cards

after I scribble in my car,

counting every hour

for the week to begin again.

-N&A