Poor Poet Rag

My throat makes one more attempt
at swallowing its ballpoint Adam's apple
but the poems keep coming up
I soak the notebook
in milky acid syllables.
A body can't just digest itself,
you need the words for consumption.
Without a howling alphabet
your squares are slashed in half
& every meal falls into hungry triangles.


The rules are emptying my cupboards right now.
I am eating out of the kindness of my roommate's heart right now.
my wallet folds into a set of empty eyes right now
the blinking gasps asking: & then;
& then;
& then?