Robert Beveridge

The King and Queen Assaulted by Swift Nudes[1]

shards

of what passes for amber

glass

rip through the canvas

Marcel, wife of toads

throws his brush

to the pavement

reaches for the shotglass

a chocolate-grinder stares

at him from behind the door

1. The title is, of course, a play on this: https://philamuseum.org/collection/object/51461

Maybe We Should Have Inquired About the Boy[2]

Somnambulent ride in the breakdown lane

brings you back to the same truck stop

you’ve dreamed about once a week

your entire life. You go in, sit down,

order a stack and three over easy

just like you’ve seen it in your head.

You don’t remember if the guy

in the green jacket was always there,

but it seems reasonable enough.

You add the extra syrup, dig in,

and remember that every time

right about now you realized

you were in your underwear.

You keep forking pancakes

into your mouth, don’t look down.

2. Plagiarism note: the title is a line from G.G. Allin’s “War in My Head” (from War in My Head/I’m Your Enemy, 1992)

Occluded

jerked awake at five

to five in the morning

by the sound of a footstep

heavier than a death

in the family against the floor

the entire apartment quivers

like your breath pitched high

then you can’t get back

to sleep because the clown

in the corner of your room

processes the area’s stray

dogs into crayons and you

are pelted over and over

with shards of wax

Salutation

Worth every penny,

the dingo said, as he

tucked the remains

of dinner into his

pocket. The waiter

brushed the crumbs

from the table, sent

the cloth to be

laundered. Would

the motor oil stains

ever come out?

Sebum

It is the ninth day

and the extinct

memories sink

even further

into the forgotten

swamp

Skunk Sauce

- How much that propane set

you back? - Three-fifty. - Did

you keep it in the tablespace?

- Nah, forgot. But the wire

extended stretches round

an entire hard-boiled egg,

even one featured in that

episode of Silk Stalkings

where the gang find themselves

in pursuit of their own

dopplegängers and Scrappy

turns out to be the culprit.

- Still, don’t let Chuck hear you

say that, he’s outta napkins.

- Montaigne once said that the art

of dining well is not a slight art.[3]

- This may indeed be true, but

when the table is built from materials

that make it beyond repair,

will we ever find out? - Worry

not, we can rebuild. Use

the methane for the saw, take

down the cherry tree in the back.

I shall search for nails.

3. The quote is accurate (despite the speakers being less than reliable) and from the essay “Of Experience”.

Wretch

Crawls to the trashcan,

peers in, checks

for week-old food

Robert Beveridge (he/him) makes noise (xterminal.bandcamp.com) and writes poetry on unceded Mingo land (Akron, OH). He published his first poem in a non-vanity/non-school publication in November 1988, and it's been all downhill since. Recent/upcoming appearances in The Bamboo Hut, Password, and The Stray Branch, among others.