Scott C. Holstad
 
lll
ER Night

hear the broken silence 
breaking hard and jagged, 
cries of small child 
frightened under bright 
fluorescence. smell rotten 
stench of decaying fag 
beside me, dying of pneumonia, 
spattering the floor with 
contents of his stomach.

they keep rolling in. 3 
freshly raped little black girls, 
confused at the confusion 
surrounding them. 2 drunk 
teens who drove through a house, 
1 minus legs and the other minus 
face, little shit faced girlfriend 
shrieking hysterically, trying to 
wipe the blood off her hands. got 
'em lined up in the hallways, in 
chairs, on stretchers and beds, 
mouths all moving uselessly, 
nothing works.

the cubicle keeps getting a little 
smaller, the walls are sweating and 
the curtain has two dark bloodstains 
like hungover eyes staring out. x 
rays keep coming and going.

kid brought in gang wound to the head. 
lady next door keeps wimpering about 
her bladder bag and the girl next to her 
pisses all over herself, screaming the 
whole time.

doctor finally says you ain't going to die 
pal and the filthy night air hits the face
hard on the way out.
 

Somewhat Warped Observations

I sit here comfortably drunk, smoking
cigarettes and staring at people rather
blatantly.  The lights seems somewhat
harsh but I squint and it's not too bad.
Besides, everything is blurred.  You
noticed people a little more clearly in
that condition.  The snouts are a little
larger, the horns a little sharper, the
hooves more well defined.

People tend to get nervous when you
stare at them.  They are racked with
enough insecurities as it is.  They always
look away, glance back quickly and
look away again.  Some part of them
melts and as they attempt to gather
themselves, their flesh forms puddles at
their feet.  Once I wanted to speed the
process along and tried to light a buxom
brunette but it didn't work and she
wasn't overly receptive and it really
doesn't matter.

There's a big whole in these people, even
the long-legged ones, and they eat and
eat because they don't want to die; at
least they want to revel in their misery
for one more day, and they look back at
me with suspicious eyes and then they
go back to their dead life and dream of
peace and love and compassion and I
continue to stare at them in a drunken
stupor.
 

Dead Horse Lake

dreamin

dreams of a dead horse lake
content in its complacency

of moldy mattresses
rusty razorblades

a certain
sickness of the soul

when my lover wakes she tells
me of her dreams flowers
resplendent in their blooming
delicacy

I have nightmare
        a dead horse lake
        society on the edge
        murders and guns
        of being chased by
        the Dark Man
        big brother in a
        land of apathetic
        entities and oh my
        friend reality is often
        little more than a mirror
        reflecting visions made
        of ice and steel

cold
permanent
and carefully
contrived.
 

dreaming of a never to be seen prime
 

aging ex

                        beauty queen w/
death march make up covering
year tracks
 

                (can still sling 'em
w/ the best) orders anti-aging
coffee at counter

        diggin deep into Louis
V whilst plain jane looks on
somewhat wistfully tormented
face

twisted
by that

which she
        
        can't have.
 

retro

it's
part of the new way
i heard it on the radio
the new deal
folks
violence
for a violent generation
and none of this
candy coated shit
either
they
found a little girl
been chained in her
closet six years
father clit whipped
her every day
Tyson said he didn' t
hurt her
i mean
no black eyes
no broken ribs
funny

violence doesn't occur
unless useless visible
body blood pouring
out of shattered
flesh courtesy of
street legal Uzi's
because "GUNS DON'T KILL
PEOPLE PULL TRIGGERS"
        sure
        asshole
a child sees 7 acts of
random violence per half
hour of cartoon programming
and we wonder why we're the
Degenerate Generation
        and
Bush screeched about

New World Orders 
        kinda like 19th 
        century world orders


Scott C. Holstad has several English degrees and has authored eight
collections of poetry.  His most recent book was "Places" (Sterling House P,
1995).  His work has appeared in hundreds of magazines around the world,
including The Minnesota Review, The Wisconsin Review, Poetry Ireland
Review, Exquisite Corpse, Long Shot, Chiron Review, Pacific Review,
Arkansas Review, and Southern Review.  He is currently shopping two chaps
and two full lengthers.  His Web site is at www.well.com/user/sch/.
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