nostalgia
to a child all is new
even the repetition of
each spoon to mouth,
the mother's coos,
a father's fist in the wall,
the dropping of the bear
from the bed to floor,
scrawling vocabulary words
across uncountable pages,
the thirty-second run through
of Gran Turismo 2 — no matter
how many times maybe this
time will be different until slowly
then all at once adulthood arrives
& you realize it doesn't change &
this time is quite like all the other
times & the past is all romance
& blurred dreams, a simpler time
when you didn't know better
because you didn't know to know
better, a never-ending hangover
where the dog always bites no matter
how much hair you grasp &
the trick is to do new things
even if they scare the ever-living
fuck out of you within reason
of course because opioids & fascism
can fuck right off thank you very much
but otherwise forget the living room
bromides screen printed on too many
cheap two by fours which is to say
don't live or laugh or love but grab
something by the balls & ride that sucker
until you gasp & shake & cry because
every day should not be lived like
it's your last but like an orgasm
that leads to a jelly-kneed collapse