Featured Poet: Nick Demske

THE BRIDGE


Now this product here should have been recalled p
Ages ago. Nothing a little duct
Tape won’t fix, right? But lo! Besight thy barometer lect
Ures, these intimate sui-soliloquies.

No animals were harmed during this poem’s composition.
However, outrageous scores of humanoid abortions at its unveiling.
This shouldn’t have happened, this. Self-fulfilling
Prophecy in the sense of chronic masturbation.

We give away the punch line in our first
Mortal utteri. What did you expect
Orate? And now, forecasted or not, the bats
Storm the belfry, the thunderheads clap, the dingle-flavored berries, uncle-climact

Ick, narcotica prissy self-gratified non-prophet:
AWE SHIT!




IN THE STACK OF EMPLOYEE SELF-EVALUATIONS


How like you these mine pre-rejection note gathereds
Unblotto auto bi ogreaphy hazards?
How like you mine glamour shots? Loosely tied robe
Peaking leprose decreprose in patrol car strobe

Twilight (cuff me officer, make Me make
no sudden movements). How like you—this discontinued Merchandise!
Slight resemblance in the sinews,
The faulty parts that will one day cease to shake.

I have been squeezing this rock for two
Decades plus, but no water. Just pus
And this gangster-rapper-thank-you-curtsey.
I had been squeezing this rock for you
Stranger, God, etc. My work has bound me thus:
Collected, selected, forgotten. And thirsty.




AS A DOG RETURNETH TO HIS VOMIT


On my mother’s grave. On all things holy.
On my first born child’s virginity. On the rebound, Nick Demske—
You smell like Lazarus returning in the form of
A cyclical argument. You smell like protesters burning Mein Kampf.

I promised myself I wouldn’t cry. I stuck a needle
In my eye and all I got was this lousy needle.
In my eye. Please continue to hold and your prayer will
Be answered in the order twas received. Well

Look who’s crawling back to the question for forgiveness,
Take a look at relentless repentance. Just one won’t hurt. I promised
Myself I’d stop writing poems. I broke that promise.
I line broke that promise. I enjambed that promise

So far up the Muse’s tuchis he still shits shards of meter. I drink from this vomit,
I’ll barf in this vomit. I poured every last drop down the sink. I promise.





HALF-FULL BEDPAN
for Valerie Laken

Generosity makes me uncom
Fortable. Their disfigurements make them collectable. I am in love with you or some
One not unlike you. Everyone and their mom
Must go. Go demagnetize your moral com

Pass, go prepay after dark, sanguine. If everybody were handicapped,
We’d treat everyone like handicapped
People. If I paid taxes,
I could write this off on my taxes.

The defendant pleads guiltier than you or I could imagine, your honor. There’s snow
In my mailbox. But it, too, will melt. Nick
Demske, you have kissed two girls in your life and one
Has since become a lesbian. The other died on impact.

Ah Life! You hander of lemons. Never foreseeing their juice
Would quench your papiris lacerations thus.





PLAY DEAD
Virginia Tech, April ‘07

Please take a moment to silence all cell
Phones for this moment of silence. Please tighten all
Shock collars, pick up all feces. Life is man’s best friend, demur
Ely waiting to be put to sleep. Behold, the perfect credit score. Behold, the super

Model citizen. I had a breakthrough in therapy today, which cost
A little extra, like all things convenient. Life is the slowest
Death. Death is the slowest

Dance of the super senior prom. Hold me close.
Woof. Nick Demske, you exclusive interview with the ghost of Kerberos,
You are stomping out a self-ignited bag of shit
You are explicitly gasted with

Flabber. Your house training’s abhorrent. Sit. Stay. Beg for one last chance.
Cash or Credit? Is this seat taken? May I have this dance?





Nick Demske lives in Racine, Wisconsin, and works there at the Racine Public Library. His self-titled manuscript was awarded the Fence Modern Poets Series award and will be published by Fence Books in fall of 2010. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Action Yes, Sawbuck, Pinstripe Fedora, West Wind Review, Weird Deer and the e-anthology narrative (dis)continuities: prose experiments by younger american writers (Recycled Karma Press, forthcoming), among other places. He helps curate the BONK! performance series in Racine and is the editor of the online forum boo: a journal of terrific things. Visit Nick sometime at his website.

© Copyright 2009 Nick Demske