Winner of the 2019 Hot Lincoln Statue Poetry Contest

"American Royals" and "Jenny"

to Mrs. Burrell

When Ms. Griffin was fired, my mother said 
it was because she... more

Cut it out, will you? This too-clever stratagem cuts no ice with me. Whereupon her lover cut across the stone field, balancing an embarrassment... more

Nights shipwrecked / in nameless wanting

The city a floating glass 
garden / to be lost in

Banished from the blinked-out... more

Morning smells like horseradish,
dogshit. The squat toilet in my uncle’s house:
too cramped to hold

a breathing thing. My... more

Case VIII

Mlle X, a fifteen-year-old girl, spent several months, during the winter of 1883,... more

Exchanging one anya-nyelv, mother-tongue, for another is like 
nibbling salted peanuts at the sticky bar top,
unplanned but... more

Because of its hardiness and tendency to escape cultivation, these non-native wisterias are considered invasive species in... more

can of whoopass, you USDA Certified lover, 
you fiery red Camaro, you hole in the wall.  

When my mother built me
again, she did not wait for sobs

to pass. She left clasps undone
then wept in her bedroom.

I... more

What's It Like?

           We have made unspeakable mean indescribable:
           it really... more

the man who touches you also touches
the other women of the city, this special
man who you chose to be... more

I will shake your hand now. Later maybe we will have drinks. 

every movie ever has big hard cocks. ass. tits. sorry, I meant porn. sometimes when I travel I listen to the radio. the songs make me think of... more

One Night We Drove Through Yellowstone

I dreamt of a white bear last night,

like the ones in the... more

MINIMUS OPUS

1997
I was hiding behind a chair
Cutting off all my hair
My father asked me
If I was... more

the child inside of me
has become comfortable
with the heat of the months
as they melt down
like hot wax then build one
on top of the... more

King of the Road

naked as death
begging on the highway

I calibrate the instrument
of my... more

I often confuse the dead horses
for trees. I say things like termites

care about the weather, or dark stars
will... more

Carrot Flowers

We are toward somewhere in the first sentence. There is June & us or us or June... more

Neck Tattoo

Your neck tattoo spoke to me but I needed a
translator. Needed a nail gun, a barn wall... more

real / unreal

last night i had a dream         
            that my teeth fell
out all in a... more

Vapor of Breath

All hail Michigan Dogman. All
slobber and standing seven feet
tall, Michigan Dogman... more

the babies are most dangerous because
            they have not learned how to control their... more