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Lungfish

I guess I’ve been slumming it

all these years,

big fish in a small pond

and all that.

But when you’ve never had anyone in your corner

whispering in your ear,

it’s easy to settle for less

and still feel good about it.

But there comes a time

when being the big fish feels like drowning,

when there’s not enough oxygen to go around

and round and round.

That’s when it’s time to get out,

wait for that rainy night,

take a deep breath and crawl through the mud

in search of a bigger pond.

***

How the Dead Teach the Living

At first, it’s business as usual,

eat, drink, bicycle along the littered streets,

play tic-tac-toe with empty building windows,

your pitching arm has never been so good.

Sleep in beds made for dignitaries,

piss from the balconies of penthouse suites,

but it gets lonely at the top,

and the plumbing no longer works.

So, you set out on your bicycle

to find another mutant,

someone like yourself (preferably female),

an Eve to your Adam.

But the days pass uninterrupted,

and you finally realize you are truly alone,

if only you had understood this

before it all fell apart.

***

Pallbearer

We all know what’s coming,

so, let’s stop this silly pretending,

always searching

for that alternate ending

where the actor doesn’t die

and true love dodges cancer

and life goes on happily ever after.

It’s not healthy, this obsession,

all the lying and denying,

all this death defying,

all this why-oh-why-ing,

when, to be fair, in fact,

we’ve all been pallbearers

secretly carrying death all along.

So, let’s halt this funereal procession,

put down that weight

and escape into the night,

find an island and be humbled,

or get lost in a jungle,

or find a cabin on a lake

in some remote untamed wild.

Because life is for the letting,

for the forgiving and forgetting,

for the fleeting and the faltering,

for the sinners and the saints.

Life is here to carry you,

not bereave or bury you,

but take you to where you need to be.

***

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Bio:

Kurt Newton’s poetry has appeared in Hobo Camp Review, Heroin Love
Songs, Unlikely Stories, and Cajun Mutt Press. His chapbook collection,
animals, was recently published by back room poetry.

@kurtdnewton.

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