That's The Hell We're In
       

I'm writing from down here
among the overheated meek

who didn't inherit the earth,
and the singed goblins

and boiling trolls
of unfulfilled promise.

By the way, did you tell
Adele about us?

Did you mention
that when I opened

a thriller
in that bookstore

without AC last August
the arsonist-firefighter protagonist

had your last name?
When I was a kid,

our car often died
leaving Rockaway beach

on eighty degree days
causing my father to yell,

That's the hell we're in.
Some say there's a way out,

that God forgives,
but I haven't survived

his last judgment.
I lost him

between the flame
and the cinder,

the boardwalk
and the splinter.

I lost him
in my devotion

to that unholy trinity
of me, myself and I.

Speaking of identity,
I'm wondering

if you signed your last letter
Love,

or were those spikey marks
the legs of a crushed bug?

That's the hell we're in.
We believed

a Broadway play
would bring a dose of cheer

but the drama began
before the curtain rose:

a man clubbed his son
on the shoulder

with a rolled-up program,
and the rotund buffo

beside me
emptied a bag

of licorice vines
onto his warm lap

and I could hear him
eating the nearly silent

surreptitious treat
until the curtain fell.

That's the hell we're in.

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Copyright © 2022 John Skoyles All rights reserved
from Yes and No
Carnegie Mellon University Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission