33
by Shawn Misener
Instead of careening into
a mid-life crisis I found
myself thinned out and
spiraling through a neon
pharmacy sign. You all
wished me well and I never
looked back. There were
aliens hovering over the
apartment complex and
strange men …

Wildebeest (Panic Attack)
by shawn misener
In this rain
slanted sideways
all people wash out the same
wet shadows
losing focus takes more effort
than keeping it
moving about the block
trying to forget such a trauma
in such a storm
a wildebeest escaping a pillow
dreaming …

Charles Bronson
by shawn misener
Blue mushroom smoke echoes
from Charles Bronson’s head
steadily pumping the doobie
he leans over the mezzanine rail
I approach him from behind
beer swinging from my fingers
fuzzy memories of his films
interposed with his exhaling real body
and …

gunter grass
by shawn misener
Behind the soap company
rested a toad named Gunter Grass
he was a goddamned giant animal
the size of an angry tank
Gunter ruled the city
by suggesting new soap formulas
everybody on the block
smelled like fairy breath
or …

The Art of Listening
by shawn misener
this world orbits dimensions unsure of themselves
and these tiny creatures inside me rule everything
eyebrows raise while eyeballs fly
to the tune of the fourth stooge, an indomitable spirit
whose spit makes rain …

Testes Theology
A time/space bounce between Shawn Misener and Quasimofo
1.
They erected PVC crosses
marking an apocalyptic energy pattern
from Lansing to Stephenville
They sucked energy drinks through their ears
while Jesus stood at the end of a diving board
made solely …

Michican 2009
by shawn misener
I haven’t seen an unemployment line,
but I have seen an unemployment room
stuffed with computers and people
who will help if you raise a hand.
My romantic visions of withstanding
the brutal winter in a jagged …

Black Friday
by shawn misener
We’re done being thankful
My ego is barking from a barn
my selfishness is tearing a hole in my eyelids
my veins are splayed lines of bleeding consumers
The turkey’s in my pocket
waiting with the patience …

Scar Tissue in a Cosmic Holding Pattern
by shawn misener
My state of being is only loosely held together
with thin pearly lines of something like hope
something I used to call optimism
before God hit me over the head …

Hills No More (Return of The Whooshay)
by shawn misener
The Body of Christ melts in your mouth
not in your hand.
Jesus would be better served as milk chocolate
laced with expensive shiraz
and dusted with dehydrated lake trout
They sell …

The Meat of the Bacon Fish
by shawn misener
Bacon fish meat
is the stuff of lore in the mountains
I saw the Captain Lou Albino look-alike
savoring one tiny bite after the other
from his corner table outside Beggar’s
His …

michael jackson
by shawn misener
They all go from geniuses to freaks
emerging from brilliant white closets
to faces painted white
they all go from geniuses to freaks
They pop out of nowhere like stray bubbles
and linger like steel memories around …

A Noose of Injection Molded Plastic
by shawn misener
He trudged home from work
and stuffed his magic under the couch
where soon a moldy rainbow would emerge
spreading cocaine and kool-aid sprinkles
across the avocado shag carpet
He sat there under …

The Perfect Salad
by shawn misener
Several years ago I made the perfect salad.
Place: The teacher’s lounge, where over-stressed and decompressed educators “unwind”, a place where school politics are carried out through teeth slathered in ranch …

The Golden Cough
by shawn misener

There’s a bottom, see
we’re spiraling in a digital way
toward the apocalypse
I never believed in a new age
but my heart is warm and clicking, see
Tom Brokaw on the television
in glistening high definition
He’s …

American Haiku
by shawn misener
bigger and safer
fuel-efficient/ dominant
nuts exposed to kick
price of milk doubles
when cows demand their corn feed
and humans oblige
I found the wizard
deep inside my cereal
drowning in skim milk
I smirk at my luck
when the lottery …

Return to Form
by shawn misener
you thought of jerking off to faces of death
and instead chose to paint murals at the old folks home
next to the jello factory
you burnt all of your books and proceeded to …

 
That’s Not Me
by shawn misener
Who you see in that picture is not me
He’s some guy I found up North
and hired to be Shawn Misener
He only cost me a week a year
at this beautiful Lake Superior …

bob munchkin had a rifle in his silver pants
by shawn misener
lungs rising from the smoke
the man dipped slowly into cement
wagged and waved
cautiously insane
creeping past the bed womb
with his eyes on the guy’s prize
ova paranoia on …

Fourth Meal
by shawn misener
Swung by in a rush
for fast food Mexican
the voice inside the box
totaled me out
then asked one more
perplexing question:
“would you like to donate a dollar
to help end world hunger?”
I tried for a second
to …

My Side of Town: A Review of Important Events and Thought Sequences
by shawn misener
I.
I live on the corner of Wise and Jolly Roads, couched into the Southwest side of Lansing, Michigan. In my estimation …

The Black Whale of L-Town
byy shawn misener
Yesterday
they moved a 900 pound man
from his home near mine
by cutting down two trees
sawing open the back of his house
and extricating him with a forklift
he came out wrapped in
a …

Wonderkids
by shawn misener
if you take a tennis ball
soak it in kool-aid
and implant it in a fresh loaf of wonderbread
you get something very special
and very disturbing
someone old and wise
or maybe just jeff goldblum
warned about fucking …

smirk furrow and smile
by shawn misener
want to make money now?
sell your hairspray
your bag o’ cheetos
and your indefatigable soul
sell your words to the devil
your gonads to god
and your plants to the fire
cheese it up
in the meatball …

Lansing
by shawn misener
you’re a staunch tuna sandwich
a familiar mars bar
the drunk guy giving quarters to some floozy
at the end of the bar
you’re the reality
and the meth the billy brewed
in his moldy basement
you’re a dead dream
rolled …

Hemispheric Terrorism
by shawn misener
There are places in this world bent
by terrible doubt and the disturbing
feeling that if you let your guard down
for one second the whole thing will
collapse around you, leaving you
dumbfounded in the ruins …

Buk’s Dead Body
by shawn misener
Hank’s corpse, suspended over the room,
drips alcoholic blood on all of us.
It’s been up there for almost forty years
and someone should consider taking it down.
It stinks.
All I see around me …

Laptop Sally
by shawn misener
it’s with fuzzy fingers
that I finger you
my love
I wait for you to come
and I twitch away
with fingers fuzzy
and brain looped on pot
maybe I’ll step out
and catch a parliament
on the ghetto porch
I guess …

Go She Hi Gra O E (Pffffft)
by Shawn Misener
We are not safe
ever
We are the product of
salad shooters and
fried twinkies
We build foam walls
to keep the ethnics
out
We cringe vigilantly
at the turban-wearing
terrorists
(PFFFFFT)
We are the sum total
of our bad …

the asterisk is not me, it’s steven wright
by Shawn Misener
In this world we are giants
puffed up with air
we bumble and bobble across the neon plains
in this world we have full-body tattoos of ourselves:
except taller
and with …