Contributor: Frank Grigonis

- -
there are days hot enough
to send beer bottles
into cracked walls
and cracked skulls
and policemen
through the doors
of the working poor
without air conditioning

days hot enough
to spark curses upwards
into the searing sky
from even the mouths
of the meek
and the mild

and on these days
it becomes clear
that our sun
is no smiley-faced
friend

but instead
it's an interrogation lamp
scorching our faces
as it searches out
every blotch, wrinkle
and lie

it's a mad, hot
irradiating furnace
the mother that gave
unholy birth
to the mad, hot hells
where the many
live and writhe

it's a swirling ball
of cancer
for which there's
no cure
except for the one
that will come
when it finally dies
in about 5 billion years
according to our
comfortable, air-conditioned
men of science


- - -
Frank Grigonis writes poetry, short fiction, and is working on a novel. His work has been published in literary magazines and e-zines: Whiskey Island, Snow Monkey, Nerve Cowboy, Blank Gun Silencer, The Horror Zine, Every Day Fiction, Leaves of Ink, Farther Stars, and others.