States of Being

This poem is a Google Adwords ad
intruding into the sidebar of your heart.

It’s a 1-800-LAWYERS commercial 
making you money off your personal injury.

It’s a brutal, bloody UFC bout 
weak in its ground game but knows its Jiu-Jitsu
 and it’s got you on the mat, begging you to tap out.

This poem is FUBAR, 
a SNAFU waiting to happen.

It’s the tear gas America uses against its own 
and it’s the attack Americans will respond with, 
using revolt to fight law enforcement’s militarization.

This poem is a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken 
getting your finger-lickin’-good fingers nice and greasy.

This poem is yet another poet writing yet another poem about poems,
with the word poem repeated ad nauseum.

This poem is a bunch of awful band names
 like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Tapes ‘n Tapes, and Chunk! No, Captain Chunk!.

It’s a summer blockbuster and a teen dystopian trilogy.

It’s riding bitch in your ex’s car.

This poem is anthropogenic global warming 
whose CO₂ emissions are dangerously high and climbing 
while its polar bears are stranded on the broken ice floes of its verses.

It’s a baseball crowd speaking the words “no hitter” 
in the midst of a no-no 
which itself is a no-no.

Its bad grammar, who’s comma’s are all, out of place 
and its’ apostrophe’s, are meaningless.

This poem is Zooey Deschanel,
who will not marry me some day, any day, in the future. 
In fact, it doesn’t even know I exist.

Mike Jewett is editor and publisher of Boston Poetry Magazine. His work has been published, or is forthcoming, in Yellow Chair Review, Clarion, and Coup d’Etat. His anthology, recipes for hemlock, is available on Lulu. He roosts with his punk rock wife and punk rock son.