RICH BOUCHER
Makeup Tips for the Eye of Horus
I thought they were actually demons
so I let the Neanderthal out of me and howled for blood;
I started hollering and yelling old man phrases after them
get the hell off my lawn and all that
even though I live with my girlfriend in her ex-husband’s house,
and what little lawn we have is barely enough for anyone to get off of;
I didn’t know if they were Jehovah’s Witnesses or Jehovah’s Door-to-Door salesmen
but I stood my ground Florida-style with extra pulp and bellowed,
bellowed even though I hadn’t shaved or Axed my body
and today’s modern alchemists symbolize resistance to change at an elemental level
with a line drawing, laid on its side, of Lady Gaga hate-fucking Emily Post into oblivion;
like a man dispossessed I chased those three or four youths away from my front door
and yes, I’ll still use the term youths even though I’m almost forty-five
and the WWII vet at Wal-Mart would consider me a youth;
it turns out they were the new religious tract salesmen
but they were not selling seventh day advent anything at all;
they were selling that I should like what MTV has become now;
they were selling that I should be ready for the Syrian slap-chop apocalypse;
they were selling that I should start not knowing the meaning of gender anymore
and in modern alchemy the symbol for fear of being wrong about a new person’s gender
is a line drawing, laid on its side, of a stick figure man in a skirt in a wheelchair digging a grave;
they were selling that I should learn to speak like the modern young people
and begin to become ambiguous, that I should begin to be afraid of being exact,
that I should start thinking of asking for a clear, concrete yes or no as being rude;
it was the best three in the afternoon ever and I had the day off;
I was just eating my cereal just in a t-shirt and just my boxers
and it was a dark and stormy night even though it was three in the afternoon;
I chased them out of my cul-de-sac on that overcast Thursday
like I was St. Anthony and they were a pack of demons
and I was running them away from here, forcing them off of Egypt’s cliff;
I ran after them past the open living room windows of my neighborhood;
I heard the soap opera women crying in the daylight air,
wailing like the witches in the olden-time movies,
weeping with all due loudness and inconsolable
because it seemed like there was no one who could remember 1985;
I heard the octogenarian infomercials asking who was that masked man
as fiery spit flecks flew out of my muzzle as I chased them chased them chased them
until they were at last and forever out of my empty middle-of-the-workday driveway
and in today’s secret, modern alchemy, the symbol for ironic dissolution,
the symbol for precipitative collapse into your own first, base element
is a drawing, laid on its side, of Lindsay Lohan wetting herself
while trying to light a joint in a world-famous elevator.
Makeup Tips for the Eye of Horus
I thought they were actually demons
so I let the Neanderthal out of me and howled for blood;
I started hollering and yelling old man phrases after them
get the hell off my lawn and all that
even though I live with my girlfriend in her ex-husband’s house,
and what little lawn we have is barely enough for anyone to get off of;
I didn’t know if they were Jehovah’s Witnesses or Jehovah’s Door-to-Door salesmen
but I stood my ground Florida-style with extra pulp and bellowed,
bellowed even though I hadn’t shaved or Axed my body
and today’s modern alchemists symbolize resistance to change at an elemental level
with a line drawing, laid on its side, of Lady Gaga hate-fucking Emily Post into oblivion;
like a man dispossessed I chased those three or four youths away from my front door
and yes, I’ll still use the term youths even though I’m almost forty-five
and the WWII vet at Wal-Mart would consider me a youth;
it turns out they were the new religious tract salesmen
but they were not selling seventh day advent anything at all;
they were selling that I should like what MTV has become now;
they were selling that I should be ready for the Syrian slap-chop apocalypse;
they were selling that I should start not knowing the meaning of gender anymore
and in modern alchemy the symbol for fear of being wrong about a new person’s gender
is a line drawing, laid on its side, of a stick figure man in a skirt in a wheelchair digging a grave;
they were selling that I should learn to speak like the modern young people
and begin to become ambiguous, that I should begin to be afraid of being exact,
that I should start thinking of asking for a clear, concrete yes or no as being rude;
it was the best three in the afternoon ever and I had the day off;
I was just eating my cereal just in a t-shirt and just my boxers
and it was a dark and stormy night even though it was three in the afternoon;
I chased them out of my cul-de-sac on that overcast Thursday
like I was St. Anthony and they were a pack of demons
and I was running them away from here, forcing them off of Egypt’s cliff;
I ran after them past the open living room windows of my neighborhood;
I heard the soap opera women crying in the daylight air,
wailing like the witches in the olden-time movies,
weeping with all due loudness and inconsolable
because it seemed like there was no one who could remember 1985;
I heard the octogenarian infomercials asking who was that masked man
as fiery spit flecks flew out of my muzzle as I chased them chased them chased them
until they were at last and forever out of my empty middle-of-the-workday driveway
and in today’s secret, modern alchemy, the symbol for ironic dissolution,
the symbol for precipitative collapse into your own first, base element
is a drawing, laid on its side, of Lindsay Lohan wetting herself
while trying to light a joint in a world-famous elevator.
Wholesome Television Memories
I always hated that one episode of Little House on the Prairie where, after rescuing a seriously ill, unconscious Reverend Johnny Johnson from his runaway wagon in a blizzard, an innocent, down-on-his luck high school bully I once had named Caleb puts on the clergyman's collar and devises a plan to fleece the charitable townsfolk of Walnut Grove; I always hated that one episode where Florence was hired as the church’s maid against the wishes of Laverne DeFazio, that one episode where Dan Mateo, the Alphans' botanist, started turning into a murderous, disfigured ghost while the Riddler got taken over by an alien manifestation, that one episode where Helen Keller taught Nellie Oleson how to do sign language in the cornflower field and I discovered masturbation, that one episode where they found azure and cerulean bones in the bell tower and it caused my mother to want to be buried in Hazelnut Grove, that one episode where Melissa Sue Anderson had a flat tire in a bad neighborhood and got harassed by a committee of Amish youths until Jan became allergic to Tiger and I had to run for student body president against the both of them, that one episode where Mr. Hooper asked Big Bird to help Charles Ingalls open up the store for him, that one episode where celebrated shaman Namutebi Okoro moved from Uganda to Philbert Grove and was forced to marry Laura Ingalls while I watched, while they all tried to drown me and my dinosaur in Plum Creek, that one episode with the suicide of my friend from school, that one episode with my parents’ funerals, that one episode where my marriage disappeared, that one episode where I started having a hard time believing in God.
I always hated that one episode of Little House on the Prairie where, after rescuing a seriously ill, unconscious Reverend Johnny Johnson from his runaway wagon in a blizzard, an innocent, down-on-his luck high school bully I once had named Caleb puts on the clergyman's collar and devises a plan to fleece the charitable townsfolk of Walnut Grove; I always hated that one episode where Florence was hired as the church’s maid against the wishes of Laverne DeFazio, that one episode where Dan Mateo, the Alphans' botanist, started turning into a murderous, disfigured ghost while the Riddler got taken over by an alien manifestation, that one episode where Helen Keller taught Nellie Oleson how to do sign language in the cornflower field and I discovered masturbation, that one episode where they found azure and cerulean bones in the bell tower and it caused my mother to want to be buried in Hazelnut Grove, that one episode where Melissa Sue Anderson had a flat tire in a bad neighborhood and got harassed by a committee of Amish youths until Jan became allergic to Tiger and I had to run for student body president against the both of them, that one episode where Mr. Hooper asked Big Bird to help Charles Ingalls open up the store for him, that one episode where celebrated shaman Namutebi Okoro moved from Uganda to Philbert Grove and was forced to marry Laura Ingalls while I watched, while they all tried to drown me and my dinosaur in Plum Creek, that one episode with the suicide of my friend from school, that one episode with my parents’ funerals, that one episode where my marriage disappeared, that one episode where I started having a hard time believing in God.