I'm back to writing a poem every day, whether they stink or not.

Monday, April 17, 2006

...But the Rent's Low

The house is made of arsenic-laced
lumber and a mosaic of crumbling
lead based paint.

The porch is creased on a diagonal seam
and the boards end in jagged jumbles.
The insects come and go through their own
ancestral openings in the linoleum.

There's something life-affirming in living
among the poisons, wreckage, and parasites.
You stand there very aware of your own body.

2 comments:

Pat Paulk said...

"Crumbling, parasitic flesh", but your right the "rent's low". Love it!!

Melissa Fite Johnson said...

The title absolutely makes this poem. So funny.