legalize ground beef. create nothing. consume everything. 

Legalize Ground Beef

he’d feed us when he thought we needed it
though we always did
though not always because we were hungry
we’d sit at the grill
and try and recall something
to tell someone
who instead looked at the meat
or rice in the flames of his eyes
and sometimes they’d laugh
but it was about food cooking
and not a story that wasn’t ours
and there wasn’t really any flame left in his eyes anyway
just unseasoned rice
some days I thought I could hear mom
remembering a summer vacation we didn’t have
through the connecting doors
at a neglected motel
other days it was the sound of disintegrating pills
and I wasn’t sure they were all that different
or if either happened at all

our last hibachi

I heard lifeless singing and waited to see if it was a birthday song or a death song. We did both at Cracker Barrel, sometimes even mistaking the tunes because it was impossible to distinguish happiness or sadness there. Celebration and mourning resided together in water leaking from the undercooked eggs and saliva dripping from the slackened mouths of ketamine fueled employees. 

Mistaking the two songs happened often and when it did we were deprived of our day-old biscuit allotment and a year of wages transformed into a lifetime ten percent off coupon for the affected party. They’d leave happy regardless of the outcome, either celebrating the modest discount or the slaughter of a sickly family member. 

We’d sleep in the decorative hay bales on those nights and wonder how many people we had killed to the sound of pimples erupting through our clogged pores and crawling down our skin tagged faces, as though our insides were an unfit home for a sack of yellowing puss. 

The valleys and hills of the song would determine if it was a phlegm ridden sheet cake or a twelve guage shotgun, but most of the time the staff was too stoned to remember the lyrics or carry a tune, so we did our best.  

The birthday cake was $8.99 and the euthanasia was $15.99, for an extra $3 we’d make a commemorative shirt with a live action picture of whatever took place.

We’d help carry the ruined corpse out to the car as a courtesy, with hopes of a pitied tip and sulked back to the restaurant when it didn’t come. 

Sometimes the family would ask me to pose for a picture with them for Instagram. A washed out stranger holding a fistful of indistinguishable remains and offering a thumbs up, as though it were an endorsement for the afterlife. 

“Come for the Double-Chocolate Fudge Coca-Cola Cake, stay for the seamless execution of someone who may or may deserve it,” was what Mario Lopez said in the commercials holding a replica shotgun and sitting naked on some vintage looking barrels. 

I thought about that commercial a lot and the fact that no one really came for the Double-Chocolate Fudge Coca-Cola Cake. 

one great day

our high school was next to a dog food factory
most days we breathed in the smell of animals dying for other animals
and thought our lungs wouldn’t be hungry for air anymore
but most of the time we continued to breath
and thought about how we weren’t much different 
than the factory and it’s aimless production
or the exhaust
or the animals feeding the other animals

air we once breathed

 the ribs of our savior 
didn’t protect any organs
or rise and fall
under the weight of our nightly abyss
though sometimes they did move
splinter or crack
with the tide of indifference
reflecting the gaze of soft termite eyes
on the brink of collapse
most of the time
the illusion of motion
was enough to convince us
we’d gone sailing

the ribs of our savior

I went to dinner on Tuesday
Even though I wasn’t hungry
And hadn’t been for months
Or years
To peel the scab from a ketamine hole
That craved the polluted air meant for the ceiling of that restaurant
And routinely bled into the carpeted underbelly of our town
Lubricating our feet That craved whatever was below the asphalt
Or just momentary relief from depletion
Or the blood from that unhealing wound reminded us of home 

Sometimes I’d pulverize my hands
Until there was no bone
And no prospect of creation
And hoped they cooked quickly on the flat top grill
With malt liquor fajitas 
And humanely butchered prescription pills That marbled our flesh In preparation for our own unceremonious slaughter
And I hoped that my preparation would be in a crock pot
Set to keep warm
So that no one really noticed if they were consuming or not
And my legacy was as forgettable as a seasonal appetizer

Other times I sat and wondered why I hadn’t passed that kidney stone
Or why I didn’t cry at that funeral
Or why I had found myself on a missing person shirt
At a neglected thrift store
And wondered how long I’d been gone


our fast casual happiness

some people cried
because it was raining shit
but it always rained shit
so I didn’t care too much
we were the accumulation
of someone else’s excess
so the malnourished bowels
and dehydrated urine
were seeds for creation
or adhesive for the sausage skin
containing the lips and holes left behind

and in between waves
we sensed relief
as though receiving sacrament
the body and blood of our savior
was fiber void diets
and domestic beers
and songs about satellites
for those who never looked up

later that night
we washed the shit and piss
into the drain
with a molting of unrealized dreams
and went to sleep

thinking about how nothing really happened anymore
and it took a tour of someone else’s memories
to create one of our own

dave matthews band dumps 800 lbs of human waste on boat tour

on good days
air would leave her lungs
accompanied by a name of someone we didn’t know
or a place she never visited
other days she didn’t say much at all
or asked if we went to prom together
all those years ago
and sometimes we’d tell her we did
because we missed the creases
in her cheeks
that were mostly bone now
and a ferris wheel of thinning veins
but within the carrion of indeterminable flesh and tapioca and hospital garments
and mistaken memories
or abandoned dreams
there was still bounty to harvest
still things to take
and so she knitted
under the weight of eager eyes
and stench of unhealing wounds
and we hoped that this one would mean something different
or save us from her fate
and so we sank into yellowing tiles
with our anchor or empty adoration
and called her our savior
in a crucifix memorial
celebrating daytime television

more to give

his tent was open year round
though we weren’t sure why
when we asked where his thumbs were
he told us he didn’t miss them too much
because there wasn’t anything to light anymore
at least not for him
but he could still watch others
burn what they needed to burn
or penetrate the sky with aimless duty
he said losing his thumbs
was the happiest day of his life
because in his inability
there was freedom from obligation
so he’d watch the paychecks of others
reach their climax
and know that he played a small part
in the moment of happiness
contained in the cracks of the night sky
before their return
to suffering
or worse, inconsequence


we bought fireworks from a man with no thumbs

Sometimes he’d say welcome
Other times it exhaled without sound from his collapsing retinas
But it made us happy all the same
Because we knew he meant it
Even if it was his job to mean it
To bleed on wood
And to observe us fucking
And buying
Or doing both
Sometimes not knowing which
Sometimes disappearing into meat
And reappearing cleansed
And full
I wasn’t sure who nailed him up there
But it was done with replicable corporate precision
And without passion
Suffering for the sake of necessity
And some days I wanted to suffer like he did
To accumulate enough to die in the comfort of my home
To my favorite show
And I wondered sometimes if there were other saviors
Or if we were saviors to him
As he bled out and examined receipts
Mom said if we were lucky enough
When we sinned or bought something on sale
They’d sometimes drive a nail deeper
Or flog him to climax
And they weren’t that different

we were greeted

their flesh succumbed to the weight of inconsequentiality. eagerly eroding into an indiscernible hole infested with rot. each crevice lubricated with someone else’s dreams, incapable or unwilling to hold our own. the mutilation is disregarded by anyone unfortunate enough to look, favoring instead the lifeless wall behind. our fingers; drawn to the wound, probed its tainted warmth. aiming to feel what they once felt. or perhaps to pry the flesh further into a state of unhealing. hoping the spoil would manifest on our own dying limbs. because spilled blood qualified as banal acknowledgement. because shared destruction is still shared. because our savior was freshly paved asphalt. our salvation was digital ketamine. our afterlife was an unreciprocated orgasm. we’d die someday too, and hope our wounds would be explored like theirs. 

doubt your adoration

We propped the sagging flesh of lifeless influencers in a ketamine hole of transactions The banality, our cross to bear The weight of listless observations our anchor in maintaining stagnation Massaging eyes into complacency and flesh into dull climax  We built our castle of inconsequence because we are told to do so Drinking platitudes as suppositories from quivering lips of self-proclaimed saviors We were bullish on quitting and alcoholism Our stomachs ached for the dandruff shit dusting dislodged from the bottom of a luxury boot Our compliance in the orgy of senseless daily crucifixions was our purpose Hoping someday we’d stroke the ego of the deceased long enough for one last indifferent thrust Hoping to retrieve one last pointless acknowledgement to sooth our failing organs

altar of inconsequence

we still loved each other
or that’s what the salisbury steak told us
as it was flaccidly pried from the lips
of someone who had died doing what they loved by an employee who hated what they did
who also mopped our filth from the bathrooms
and sometimes performed funeral accommodations if there was a hole big enough
he knew us better than what was left of our families
so it only made sense he mourned us
with others longing for similar peace
the buffet itself served as a mechanism for orgasm or death
sometimes the sensations being indiscernible from each other
both were priced at $5.99 on Tuesdays
and we were never quite sure which we sought
so long as our plates were full
we’d dutifully succumb to either without much interest
sometimes I could still feel you amongst the coils of meat we were lost in
resuscitated by the same heat lamps our parents were
other times
I could only feel the dull caress of pulverized animal parts
in some ways, that too reminded me of what we once had
warmth was warmth
and the air conditioner never stopped
and new holes were always being dug

consumption is family

A good harvest. A name chosen by management to instill a sense of calm in those of us required to compartmentalize every moment of productivity or inactivity during the day. It is a mechanism for us to think about colorful gourds and hot apple cider instead of leaving. A word that suggests motion or change or bounty, but we all knew the seasons never changed under our fluorescent lights and there was very little to be taken from our tainted farmlands.


They announce the new system, requirements and processes through a high importance email. It settles like fertilizer amongst our soft skulls and sunken eyes. The white noise machines provide an ideal environment for the weed to grow, for unquestioning compliance to wrap its vines around our arms and legs. We allow its dull sickle to collect time from our dwindling lot because there is nothing else to do.

Our fingers rest limply on our keyboards, eager to fill another barrow for management to scrutinize, consume and evacuate. We want to prove our value, to prove there is still something to take. We want to appear fruitful, vital, and still capable of being depleted. We receive a modest paycheck in exchange for the pillaging and perpetually yearn for the next reaping.  

The program rakes and toils away at our skin and minds like a dutiful farmer prepping his land. Extracting the flesh it deems ripe, pulling at detaching retinas as though it were picking unblemished apples. It attaches us to oxen plows and drags us through gravel, depositing more of our blood into the land. We in turn click and type, submitting reports of little consequence and taking contrived pride of our pathetic contribution.

Nothing is replenished, nothing is replanted.

We are a single use farm, providing what we can until eventually being recycled into soil for the decorative plastic plants strewn about the office. One day we’ll die in our ergonomically correct desk chairs, our legacy contained in the numbers we enter into the screen.
  
A new crop will be planted soon, whoever those people are will also be harvested and I hope their sacrifice is enough.

a good harvest

The crowd
Climaxed
When my foot penetrated
The celebrity meat
Part of me disappearing
Into the coils of our inanimate savior
He couldn’t eat any other way
And they couldn’t too
Feeding from my
Bloated boot treads
Because
It hung
In front of thrusting tongues
Indifferent of shit filled crevice
They sought
So long as it spun in a dying microwave
And reached vague warmth
To the sound of an insect orgasm

We won that year
Our prize was a lifetime of regret
Our Las Vegas residency was quiet alcoholism
Our legacy leaked from our wounds
And into the easy chairs of an entire nation
They said it was the best season yet

we won america's got talent

we exchanged arms and legs
for morsels of tired joy
distributed by a dying savior
and his feed pouch
that threatened but never achieved the  vacancy it desired or deserved

our fear of its impossible emptiness
propelled our forget
and our lust for unfeeling captivity

happily pulverizing bone and joint
for insect comfort
in a cast crafted by highway billboards
and white teeth and coiffed hair
and creations erected
solely for penetration

though our hunger was perpetual
we found reprieve
in his momentary glances
even if his eyes were too black
to discern acknowledgement
we could feel
his desire
for gift
and harvest 

we cherished the current
of the feed river
because we saw misery
in its motion
and happiness
in our inability

the scabs
on our flesh
from the metal
were the trophies received
for what we had done 

we ate brunch

we didn’t sell our dreams often
because they weren’t worth much
and the commitment to abandonment was more tiring than indifference
they’d bleed out of eventually through some wound the way we saw it
instead of being turned into recycled luxury goods for people who couldn’t afford them
or fed to livestock bound for slaughter
or burned for the sake of flame
but people kept asking
and sometimes we’d succumb to that ask
because there was a levity to giving up
to a disintegrating belief
to being the freshly paved asphalt
over a garden that once held roses
once they were gone
they seemed to come back less frequent
and the man in the store said that was normal
said eventually they wouldn’t come back at all
and he couldn’t pay us for whatever was left
but that was alright with us
they were better wrapped around the fingers of a failing marriage
or penetrating the holes
of a collapsed cloud

cash4dreams

we ate
because the man had an impressive knife
and we sat at a table that suggested we should
and we used
closing arteries
to suffocate the desire to leave
and hoped to dislodge a years worth
of waste
into stale waters later

and the sensation of our collapsing aorta
suggested the comfort of a looming settlement

the chef stroked our palate to climax
even though we couldn’t taste
even though the chewing was enough
to pass some time

his love
and the things he made
grew cold
under dying heat lamps

but we didn’t mine much
because it had no bearing on our joy

we would leave
when the man stopped carving
or when our teeth submitted to bone

or when the shapes stopped exploding

we’d think about going back from time to time
remembering the the smell
of a man’s dreams

resuscitated by a desk lamp

we weren't full yet

I sit at a bar with dried leaf walls
And high life that tastes like light bulb
a fiendish looking old man with liver spots that look like rusted metal
tells me that dying is only slightly more inconvenient than living
chuckling through a freshly packed lip of stained glass
I piss into a trough and watch the ice melt
I sit at a desk and oblige a similar stream

I hoped I’d win enough tickets to save our marriage or leave it
Or a fish in a bag
Or a fuckable commemorative candle
Maybe we’d be happy then
Maybe we’d do what they couldn’t

For now, we succumb to the weight of destruction in the air
And hope that our consciousness dwindles in unison with the sanity of the old man
Or the dull glow of neglected machines
Responsible for our salvation  

we saved our marriage

we drank polluted air from dying lungs

our church wasn’t like most
our gods weren’t either
our altar was the convention center next to an adult mega store on highway 31
we worshipped the cracking feet of two alcoholics
who could inhale and exhale
cotton candy tobacco
in a manner that
made us less sad
to live where we did

because the clouds they made
provided shade for our failed dreams
and asphalt to suffocate our blemishes
because the rot they experienced
was more than what we did

we found salvation in their sadness
because it seemed greater than ours
even though sometimes they appeared happy
or indifferent
which was better than happy

their crucifix wasn’t made of wood
and the nails propping their corpses
were the empty adoration
we pounded into their contracting lungs
when we watched

and hoped they would live forever
and we prayed that some day
we’d die like them

with the same wounds

a spectacle
and nothing else

we drank polluted air from dying lungs

we had our holes
but always made more

some sliding from our mouths
like candles from a cake
celebrating something that never happened

eager to experience the same demise
our parents did
seeking purpose in sheets
whose wrinkles grew in unison with our own
whose probing fingers
massaged indifference into muscles
already swollen with feathers
from luxury pillows
that promised to euthanize the regret
boiling with last night’s frozen dinner 

our sores were fed
because their festering
propelled us
differently than scab or scar

because we were never sure
those would come anyway

because rotting was still motion

because we shared the same disease
and didn’t have much else without it

because our tongues couldn’t pry warmth
from healed flesh anymore

because our throats longed for water and not blood

but it was all we had
so we drank

our last hibachi

Legalize Ground Beef

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