[LONG JOHN SWAN SONG] {Poetry}

I am Debra Messing on Skid Row,

Shitting in a cardboard box,

Fallen from Grace.

As cents hit rock bottom

Of my empty Starbucks cup,

The closing bell echoes

Throughout polluted ghettos.

Its sound waves float yachts

And drown out the anguished

Screams of domestic abuse from

Apartment twenty-three.

I hitch a ride on social expectation

To Jack’s Liquor Store, where

A Colt 45 and 50 milligrams

Buy my complacency for

One more night.