Cerebral Contents:

Update for 05.13.08:

Male Model by Phil Doran

Set to Replay by Willie Smith

Backsliding by Cynthia Ruth Lewis

Tree by G. David Schwartz

05.05.08:

Disintegration by Don Hucks

Five Feet and Building by Joel Van Noord

Grocery Aisle by Richard Lighthouse

Cross the Road by Ashok Niyogi

04.29.08:

Lookalikes by Phil Doran

Dinner by Brandi Wells

The Modern Covenant by Daniel E. Wilcox

Death by Onions by Michael Frissore

04.21.08:

Future's Children by Kimberly Raiser

Identity Theft by George Anderson

The Datists by Adam Engel

A Great Deal of Money by Justin Hyde

04.14.08:

Mr. Papaya and Dale by Eric Suhem

California by Caroline Imreibe

Aftermath of Vehement Argument #1,068 by Cynthia Ruth Lewis

Trip-Hammer Vitality by Lisa Nickerson

04.07.08:

The Florence of Basel, or Why Readers of Nietzsche Need to Read Burckhardt by Jeff Crouch

Slideshow by Miles J. Bell

Friends of the Poet by Sean C. Bowen

Picture Perfect by Leah Baldwin

03.24.08:

The Streak by Jeremy Hendrix

Grab Your Butts by Emme Hor

Far Away by Ashok Niyogi

Staring Down a White-Tailed Doe by Aleathia Drehmer

03.17.08:

The Hairbrush by Vernard Kennedy

Dog Days of Winter by Niall Berkeley

Poem From My Grave by Michael Lee Johnson

Mashed Potatoes and Hamburgers by Matt Finney

03.10.08:

Hard Work by Luis Cuauhtemoc Berriozabal

Jetty Cake Pigs by J.D. Nelson

I'm Quiet in Bed by Moctezuma Johnson

Tequila Shakes by Richard Lighthouse

Tatters

by Kristin Blank

I am the champion, you realize this,
and I will buy a box of wine
in a preemptive strike
(as taught)
to toast my second year:

The Queen of the Plague.

Ring of roses 'round my head
and by now I should surely be dead.

You can ask my man and you can ask my friends
and they will all tell you
I have beaten Ebola, SARS, the Red Death and the
Black Plague, now passé.

Something prettier, perhaps?
Duchess of Decay?

Dragging dirty lace tatters and stringy hair
through living rooms all over the United States...
dripping and sneering next to the glow of
Dancing With the Stars.

I kicked the Bird Flu last year,
even though not one of you motherfuckers
thought I'd make it.

Piss on you for doubting me,
piss on you for telling me
it's just a cold.

Biaxin and the Z-Pak from Dr. McCollum—
though it could be allergies;
I must believe it's the newest

and hippest pandemic,
entirely academic,

and there will always be another one.

Look into my bloodshot eyes, my darling subjects,
and we none of us will rot.

We have
been through worse.

(2006 Bird Flu Poetry Contest Plague Laureate)
______________________________________
Kristin Blank is a Renaissance woman. She is the vocalist for Sing the Evens, Play the Odds. She writes the underground comic Hate Your Friends. In her spare time, she likes to curb stomp triflin' fools.

posted 11.13.06.

Emergent Properties:

Main

F.A.Q.

About

Archives (alphabetical)
Archives (chronological)

Links - Updated 05.05.08

Books - Updated 05.05.08

Pandemic Poetry

Taglines