Poetry: Selections from Ron Riekki

We were drunk, but it was a good thing, nothing sad or explosive or alcoholic about it,

just a good solid drunk,

and we were the age where you should be drunk,

often—

not the age I am now,

where I should never even consider thinking for a second about possibly even glancing my pinky on a whiskey bottle neck—

and we were in Boston, I think,

or one of those towns around Boston.

They all bleed together.

And we were drunk.

And we started at one party and someone said they were going to another party

and so we got in their car,

forced our way in their car,

got inside,

and they asked who we were

and we didn’t know,

but we promised we’d be fun

and so they took us

and we went

and it wasn’t that far away

and I remember nothing about the people in the car

because they were safe

and boring

and proper

and a little rude

and sober

and they reminded me of the elves

that Santa refused to hire,

telling them

that he was overstaffed for elves,

so they walked away, into the snow, nowhere to go, and so they went to this party

and now we were with them

and there was snow here too,

a good queer snow,

but too thin.

The snow could have used some oomph,

but it was good for what it was.

I wanted to kiss the snow,

so I told them to pull over

because I wanted to kiss the snow,

but they didn’t pull over,

but if they did

I think I would have fucked the snow,

but they didn’t pull over

and so we got to the next party

and the snow wasn’t very attractive at that house

but we went inside

and got more drunk

and we were like birds drunk,

drunk birds,

damaging the sky with our presence,

but we were funny,

thank God,

making the humans there laugh.

I was with Josh.

I’ll name my friend now.

And he was Josh.

And I was Ron.

And we were at the party

and our drunkenness was flying around in our blood

and we were dancing to everything,

even when a girl

nearby

hiccupped.

We even danced to that.

And we were good.

We were Michael Jackson and Gene Kelly.

We were Mikhail Baryshnikov and Ginger Rogers.

If they were drunk.

Wasted drunk.

Then we’d be just like them.

And we were.

And they kissed us out.

I mean, kicked us out.

And it was their loss.

And the snow outside was even uglier.

How the night can turn you into a mugwort.

How ghosts are only terrifying at night,

because

during the day

they have their makeup on

and they look good.

And we were mugworts and we were badgers and we were eating frogs and laughing and punching stop signs and walking and

we went to a gas station

and asked a random guy for a ride home

and he ignored us

so we asked another guy,

because it’s all about numbers;

eventually someone will give in

and one of them did,

saying he wouldn’t take us home,

because it was too far,

but that we could crash at his place

until we were sober,

which is a hell of an offer

and we took it

and we got in

and his car smelled like bear piss

and his car looked like it was made in 1874

and he was an ugly guy,

just like us,

and we were at his house in two seconds

and we went in

and he said we could grab the couch

and a La-Z-Boy

and we collapsed

and he fed us water,

which we pounded like it was the apocalypse

and we drank like milkfish

and we bathed in the darkness

when he clicked off the lights

and the room was spinning around like it was made out of yams

and the morning came on like a vampire

and the sunlight was a Kraken

and I wanted to punch the sun in its dangerous face

but we had to get home.

You can’t live at a stranger’s forever.

And so we started to leave,

the owner drowning in his quiet little beautiful nightmares in the other room.

And we got to the door

and realized

you can’t just leave.

You have to leave him with

something,

except we didn’t have any money

and so we did the only thing we could do:

we started to turn everything in his house upside-down.

Quietly.

We started with little things, like cups

and coins,

which he wouldn’t know we’d turned upside-down,

but it was all for a purpose.

We turned the pillows upside-down

and the lamps upside-down

and his shoes upside-down

and the paintings upside-down,

and his memories upside-down,

quietly,

because he was in the other room

and we needed to ensure he had a wonderful monsoon of shock

when he woke up

and stepped out into the front room

and realized he’d have a story to tell for the rest of his life

and we were good

and efficient

and sober

mostly

and tiptoeing

and golden

and alive

and we left.

And we felt pride at our work.

And we started the nine mile walk home, so hungry that we could eat children if necessary,

just like the witches in all those old stories.

We’re at Ford Field and my high school’s football team is getting pounded and I don’t care, because we’re lucky just to be here

and I look around

at the cerebral palsy and poverty and obesity

of my hometown, these fans,

and how their signs are cheap and perfect and big and homemade

saying

GO PHIL!!!

and one of the exclamation points is misspelled

and we’re gorgeous

and loud

and cheering

even though we’re losing

 

and on the other side

is the Christian school that can recruit players

and we can’t

and they can

and they’re running up the score

like they’re trying to humiliate us

and they’re the second largest city in the state

and we’re a tiny town in the Upper Peninsula

and they put the camera on their quarterback,

his helmet off,

and he looks like a blonde villain

in a teen karate movie

and you can tell his parents are rich

and his neighbors are rich

and his teeth are rich

and his irises are evil and rich

and his shadows are rich

 

and I look at us,

not at the screen,

but at us,

and I want to hug the lungs of every person on our side,

and I do.

I go around and start hugging everyone,

even though we’re losing.

I hug everyone.

And we’re crying

and we’re happy

and we can’t believe we’re at fucking Ford Field

and we are.

This is a short poem, because it’s about all of the women who’ve loved me

I start to write this poem,

thinking about how I wish I was married

 

with kids

but I have to get up in the morning,

 

early as hell,

to work with trauma survivors,

 

so I don’t have time

to feel sorry for myself.

I’m Single So If You Want You Can Contact Me on Social Media and Save My Life

with just one night

where you sleep with me

 

and I mean

just sleep.

 

We don’t have to have sex

or even kiss.

 

I just want a warm body by me.

And you don’t even have to be warm.

 

You can have a cold.

I don’t care.

 

You can give it to me.

I just want to feel what it’s like when the room is singing

 

with the breath

of another person

 

in the room.

That’s the only thing

 

that makes me

believe in God.

The Teacher in the Social Work Class Treats Me Like Shit and

I don’t understand why.

 

I ask another kid in class

what he thinks

and he says

 

I’d rather relive my years of addiction

than go through this program again.

 

And we laugh

and I ask him what he means

and he says

 

When I was an addict, everyone hated me,

and I deserved it.

I was stealing from them and high all the time

and a dick and I was someone who wanted to burn down the fire department,

but then I got sober.

And I wanted to help people.

So I want to do social work to help people.

So I enter this program,

totally committing myself to helping people

and they treat me like shit,

like absolute shit,

when my whole purpose to be here is to help goddamn people

and I’m clean

and it’s hard as hell to be clean,

it’s impossible to be clean,

it’s easier to climb Mount Everest than be clean,

because you can hire a million Sherpas to carry all your shit for you,

but I’m doing this on my own

and it’s hard as fuck

because the neighbors smoke pot

and it comes in through the vents

and it makes me want to go up there

and beg to join them

so I have to leave my apartment

every time they do that

and go walk by a river

dreaming of heroin

and go stand in the river

in December

and just feel the pain

because I can’t go back

to using

and these assholes can’t

just be nice to me

for one second,

just one second.

Instead they have to call me out

and do microaggressions against me

that aren’t micro-

but are aggressions

and he says,

You know what I mean?

 

And I say, yes, God, yes, God’s eyes, yes, the testicles of God, yes, the entire body and corpse and breath and pulse of Christ, yes!

Ron Riekki’s books include Blood/Not Blood Then the Gates (Middle West Press, poetry), My Ancestors are Reindeer Herders and I Am Melting in Extinction (Loyola University Maryland’s Apprentice House Press, hybrid),Posttraumatic (Hoot ‘n’ Waddle, nonfiction), and U.P. (Ghost Road Press, fiction).