Mitchell Grabois

Boom Box I’d like to be buried with a boom boxso I can boogie my way into Hell I’d play my CD of Rokie Eriksonand the Thirteenth Floor Elevatorthe first psychedelic band and make guards from all insane asylumsstep out like the members of a ghetto marching bandIt would be torture for themas things are in HellI’d play Dylan’s Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat I’d take all the yearning in the worldand all the yearning roasting in Helland stuff it into that pillbox hatand send it to Jackie O Jackie O came to Helland she and Marilyn scratched each other’s eyes outwhich was a mutual blessingas they could no longer see what was going on around them
Stroke Tanks have rolled over my native tongueand, unlike a cartoon character squashed flat,it cannot re-inflate itselfwith a bicycle pump I am as mute as if I’ve had a strokeand I am split in twolike my country My country is green and flat and poorWe drink more booze than any people on Earthand sell our organs for bread We killed most of the Jews The rest of them ran awaythe ones who could have helped us Jews can do miraculous thingslike the one who defeated polio Now we are poor and drunkand civil war looms Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois has had over twelve-hundred of his poems and fictions appear in literary magazines in the U.S. and abroad. He has been nominated for numerous prizes. His novel, Two-Headed Dog, based on his work as a clinical psychologist in a state hospital, is available for Kindle and Nook, or as a print edition. To see more of his work, google Mitchell Krockmalnik Grabois. He lives in Denver.