David Rutter

I watched over her while she kicked dope
sweating and
xxxtwitching and
xxxxxxscreaming obscenities
xxxxxxxxx“Fuck you and all your holier than though
xxxxxxxxxxxxbullshit, “she said
She promised me
it was going to be the last time
that she would screw up this bad
and who was I to judge?
I tried to drag her from the jaws of death
but she just kept
slipping back

I sat by her at the doctor’s
all the blood and
xxxthe pus and
xxxxxxthe nose burning stench
xxxxxxxxxas he lanced one abscess after
xxxxxxxxxxxxanother
I had never
seen someone I cared about
in this much pain before
but what choice did I have?
I was trying to pull her from the gutter
but she just kept
slipping back

You know, I told myself
I loved her but I didn’t know
what that word even meant
She was just my new addiction
and the purpose and power I felt
was what was really in my grip
when I thought I was holding
her hand

I listened when she relapsed
as she lied
xxxand she lied
xxxxxxthrough her teeth
xxxxxxxxxthat she was sober, that she
xxxxxxxxxxxxwas clean
I didn’t want
to push her out
of my life forever
but that’s exactly what I did
Instead of me, lifting her up
she was only
dragging me down
so I let go of her hands
and watched her disappear
as she just kept
slipping back

“Thank God they’re only rubber,”
I think, as the bullets
Rain down on us like hail.
We try to move with the crowd,
As it scatters like the rats
Who usually rule these streets.
One wrong move, one slip of the foot,
We’ll go down and if we do,
There will be no getting back up.

Feeling the hard welts
That are starting to rise
Around my tender, aching ribs,
I think, “How did this happen?”
How did a Cinco de Mayo street party
Degenerate into this?
Mad panic free for all;
Every man, woman and child for themselves,
In a vicious storm of black, rubber bees.

About this time, to my pleasant surprise,
I realize I’m still holding my beer.
“Thank God for small favors,”
I say to myself while simultaneously realizing
That’s a lot of Jesus talk for this atheist.
I’m running wildly now and
Have no idea what’s become of my friends.
“They know how to get home,” I think,
“I can’t hold their hands all the time.”

Turning a corner, into an alley,
I am stopped dead in my tracks,
My beer bottle slipping from my fingers and
Smashing loudly in the street below.
Blocking my way are 6 fully armed riot cops,
Their guns trained on my torso.
As I drop to my knees and put my hands up,
I have the abstractly lighthearted thought,
“Even bees can kill you if they sting you all at once.”

He always wanted you
To fit into the perfect box.
He tried to round off your edges and
Slice away the quirks and
Idiosyncrasies that made you too
Wild and weird to
Perfectly fit that
Perfect box.
You desperately wanted
To fit into the perfect box.
So you stuffed your feelings deep and
Told him what he wanted to hear and
Jumped through all his hoops in
The vain hope that someday you would
Perfectly fit that
Perfect box.
It proved to be impossible
To fit into the perfect box.
You died a little more each year when
You realized that no matter
How much you bent and twisted yourself
You could never make yourself the shape that could
Perfectly fit that
Perfect box.
In the end you just stopped trying
To fit into the perfect box.
You decided to quit the game and
Exit the struggle completely and
It’s a shame you are not around to
Appreciate the irony that now, at last, you
Perfectly fit that
Perfect box.

At the reception
You look across the room
With such substantial yearning
Holding two complete convictions
Contradictory
Yet solid in your sense

The first an exaltation
That this bland and humdrum crowd
Has not the wherewithal
To incite your febrile nature
That their vanilla pleasures
Can never rival
Your intoxicating ones

The second
Just as vibrant
Yet unworthy to concede
That in a heart’s tick
You would cheerfully
Disburden yourself
Of your cumbersome uniqueness
If you could leap
Dauntless
Into their clique
And be enveloped
In their safe and soothing shelter