DRACONIAN ERROGENOUS ZONES…

…have been established throughout the city,
hoping to defuse the current social climate
with a self-activated shame cycle, accomplishing
what tear gas and a reflexive leaden thumb could not.
We ask you to examine your own bodies, and their
corrosive agenda of base desires, and wonder
if you don’t come up short. Further, we ask
if a loop can be established, a closed circuit,
between achieving those desires and the white noise
we are currently funneling into your subconscious.
In conclusion: What if Play Time was Work?
What if we could make you strike against yourselves?
What if love was the inverted spearhead
that ended the heart?

Sirens rend the night
dark windows splashed in red light
some stranger’s problems

Flash from my window
rumble through the whirling white
that was Thundersnow!

the hawk lands heavy
before taking off again
empty oak branch thrums

Snow falls in Bushwick
M-train rattles overhead
sparks and snowflakes mix

another late night
moon muddled through windowpane
I should be asleep

My glass is half full.
I don't remember drinking.
This is not my glass.

(Poem by Doug Roussin)

I saw the future
my friends were busy texting
I was left speechless

APPLY THEME

Rampant Tenderfoot
Current Protector
Inaccurate Lingo
Leisure Removal
Forward Thinking
Ash and Fire
Ash and Fire
Ash and Fire
Dark Wood
Deep Ocean
Magic Paper
Drinking DNA
Black and White
and Red All Over…

WHITE MILK SUBSTITUTE

Am I a shadow of a man if I cast none of my own?
Are we the sum and total of eight essential ingredients,
minus emotional baggage and excessive wear and tear?
If we can split the atom, the logic goes, we should be able
to gut the infidel and point his entrails to
True North. We should be able to find ourselves
on the face of the compass, by the bias of magnetism
alone. I’m all for short term myths, but we’ve
got to get the order forms right. One slip can lead
to a simple paper cut, which in turn could lead tothe slow, onion-like unraveling of my cover identity,
and since I don’t go much further than skin deep,
that’s not a view I want to keep.