Daylight Saving Time Flies Like an Instagram of a Weasel Riding a Woodpecker & You Feel Everything Will Be Alright
By Regie Cabico
The giant Slinky
of Spring approaches
& I have nothing
to sport after spending
a fortune on hooded
sweaters that make
me look like I’m searching
for the Holy Grail.
Struggling with
granola & soy milk,
dental bills accumulate
like snow & the potatoes
I forgot have rotted.
I’m broke & broke
& broke & broke
& broke, a bowling
ball spiraling down
a middle-aged
staircase of doubt.
The night I crazily
fled for the gentrified
grids of 14th Street.
A pinball, I landed
in Playbill. I left
Brooklyn tossing
televisions & futons
like bombs
in the bowels
of hipster bohemia.
In the piano karaoke
bar, I met Kevin,
a Peter Pan
Tennessee man
who spun quips & wit
like pixie dust about me.
A puckish chariot
fueled by moxie,
this lean tambourine
of charms leaned
over me, a hot flamingo
in the midnight light
& admitted his
once-upon-a-time
fetish for Laotian
men in his youth.
I wanted him to fall
for me as if he stumbled
into the inside
of an Oriental
mansion shaking
the tchotchkes
in my heart, steeping my
crush into sweet green tea.
Kevin would be my model
of elegance, unabashed
confidence, a dragon
fierceness. He said,
There’s more to Rainbow
Pride than RuPaul
& Stonewall kickball
& I finally felt
I belonged in DC.
November, Kevin’s
jaw ached. He showed
up at The Black Fox
mumbling jumble
garble through tears.
His feature canceled.
After the first break
from winter gray to blue,
Facebook alerts Kevin’s
wheeled to hospice,
liver cancer.
I teach Donmike
how to make pancit
noodles. We become
the curse of gossiping
Filipina spinster aunts.
How have we become
giggling little lily pad
princesses behind
invisible hand
fans, waiting for
our potential
suitors to make
the first move?
I wonder whether
you’re afraid my hug
lingers a little too long
after I rub your feet
or maybe you’re just
a Scorpio expressing
affection & I know
I have 3rd world Daddy
issues but I don’t want
to bring up hopes
& fuck ups.
Maybe I’m in love
with you like that
baby weasel riding
the flying woodpecker’s
back. It’s an Avatar
magical, sci-fi,
unexpected flash
of bliss when really,
the woodpecker is
fighting for his life.
The weasel doesn’t
know what it’s gotten
itself into but a thrill
that will never
come again,
something better
than a feathered
Baby Jane din-din.
Tomorrow, you’ll
want to go to Rehoboth
& kite surf at the beach
house of the guy who
lusts after you. The priest’s
sermon makes no sense:
Forest Fires in the Bay,
Water Well Maidens
& “Let It Go” from Frozen.
It’s not that I hate white
people or that we’re soul mates.
It’s that you’re beginning
to wash off me like ashes
in holy water.
Source: Poetry (April 2016)