No Good (Not Cool)

He looked at his broken tooth
in the mirror while hearing voices
outside laughing,
asking questions.
The garbage truck’s automatic
claw pinned a young girl
to the dumpster
and she screamed
while both her legs
twisted like
cirrus clouds.

I told her not to play
over there
said the blind grandma
to the EMT that wheeled
the stretcher
on the ambulance
with a world
of messed up faces
watching over her.

That night he touched
the wet window
before walking inside
his apartment and let
the water drip against
his forehead
while he slouched
with his spine curved
against a kitchen chair.

He was one face in a grid
of several thousand
ripping bites off of a roasted
chicken over his sink
while some old talk show played
in static laden stereo.

He had a gun cabinet he
carried from one small room
to another and he unlocked it
when he finished just to make sure
they were all still
where he left them.

The last night of his life took place
in 20 years on a commute home
caught downtown somewhere
in the middle of a riot.

Behind the wheel of some old pick up
he waited for a gap to clear
so he could steer around the angry people
screaming while they went to war
with everything,
but none ever appeared.

He made his tires burn
until he let go of the brake
and sent the metal that surrounded him
into every living soul still out
in front of him.

The rebels and the armored cops
alike we’re all combined into
a bloody paste before him
almost no one even experts
could delineate.

It ended when he hit a wall and still
the rear wheels never stopped their spinning,
but the living lawmen fired on him
endlessly and while they shredded him
his last thoughts were of a little girl
suspended by a metal claw, afraid.

Until she morphed into her older self
and floated with great insect wings
between the spinning earth
and still moon in the sky,
and all the metal, wire, and industrial
residue of the world became concentrated
into a sword the length of a pickup truck.

He held it in his hands,
and with his remaining strength
he buried it in her chest,
which drained the final iridescence
off the moon.

From her a crimson grin
appeared to him,
and with her shaking legs
she pulled him
even closer.