Two by Kevin Ridgeway

The House at the End of the Street

my nose and throat burn from snorting bourbon lines

laid out in long puddles across the cutting board

I’m at the house at the end of this New England street,

the punk rocker kids are nibbling on their own

waste and vomit, washing it down with Pabst Blue Ribbon

the debut of a new band is upon us in the living room,

the lead singer smashes bottles against the ketchup streaked walls

and screams into the microphone

unintelligible obscenities and manifestos

I’m not a punk but a sweater clad preppy taking in this scene

writing mental notes, a sort of twisted anthropological study

of the nation’s youth tucked away in suburban caverns

but I forget it all as I slam my drunken skull into

a nearby kid’s Mohawk head and blood drips down my nose

and I’ll go back to this house on the weekends off from

my cookie-cutter gig slinging pharmaceuticals

to my wife’s protests;

because it’s too much fun

not to burn away in the midst

of so much raging

hot apocalyptic diarrhea

The Disabled Poet

no money to clean my teeth,

shoes duct taped together

a mind like a spinning top,

time on my hands to scrawl verse

in between doctor’s visits

and monstrous moments

of a swinging mood

spotted at the food bank

with my bag of dented soup cans

and stale bread

the psychiatrist asks me

should we increase the dosage?

and I say yes

riding the smoldering bus back

to the suburban home for

broken boy soldiers

I swallow my extra pills

and transcribe the words

imprinted on the ceilings

of my mind. 


--Kevin Ridgeway