the crazy couple next door
really mix it up at night
I wait patiently in bed
for the eventual silence
that always comes at 3:17 a.m. sharp
the landlord can’t evict them
the apartment next door is vacant
Category Archives: Poetry
A laggard trick-or-treater
In a tiny cowl and cape
Came scratching at our windowpane
Beyond the velvet drape
We bid him take his leave of us
As midnight was too late
For foolish pagan rituals
We’d ne’er accommodate
He wept and told us that
They dubbed him Little Orphan Andy
He begged us for one single lick
Of copper-flavored candy
The night wore on, he ground us down
With endless tales of loss and woe
Our strife was just beginning
In the light of morning’s saffron glow
Wylde Abandyn 04/21/17
I hitch a ride with this cardboard monkey
he chatters away non-stop about some dick Harry at work
climbing his way to the top of the corporate canopy
where he can kick back and suck the fruits
of the cardboard monkey’s labors
I don’t care to mind his boring business so I pretend sleep
the cardboard monkey goes bananas
hitting the steering wheel and shaking my sorry ass awake
exhibiting aggressive behavior
letting me know that I owe for my ride
undivided attention for a gallon of gas
I figure I can do that and sit up straight
the cardboard monkey relaxes and regroups
starts up again about the treachery of brown-nosed colleagues
what a jungle it is out there
and how we all gotta kill or be killed
I’m thinking it’s a metaphor and nod like I get it
the cardboard monkey reaches across my knees
making me sort of scrunch up in the seat
he pulls a gun out of the glove compartment and points it at my face
Wylde Abandyn 12/14/10
by Wylde Abandyn 02/23/15
they met in the park at dusk one day
two people shaped cutouts
darker than the shadow cast by the looming mountain
behind which the sun hid its face
ashamed as it was to witness such a personal moment
of internal pain and public discovery
she pushed a wheelchair draped in mourning black lace
he guided a baby carriage with the hood fully engaged
she spun him a yarn about her sickly old grampy
he told her a tale of single daddyhood
from within the draped wheelchair and the hooded baby carriage
silence
by the time that soft wind kicked up
the one that blows away the ashes of day
(night’s breath, she said grampy called it)
they were one in spirit
the next day, the garbage guy shook his head
as he tossed the perfectly good wheelchair
and brand new baby carriage
into the back of the truck
“You never know what you’ll find at the park,” he’d tell his wife later
