KARMIC CLEANSE

Everything is lining up in 2026.
It's cosmic as fuck.
It's celestial.
You don't have to believe this.
Who am I?
I'm the CEO of Chupacabra Disco.
I'm a mother who played dead in front of El Alamo in 2018 with her son 
protesting gun violence with assorted other fuckers holding up signs.
I'm a woman who has her grocery list from 2011 tattooed on her left forearm.
I'm a woman who bakes bread from scratch and buys helium balloons
at the dollar store to release to the sky for symbolic purposes.
I'm nothing.
I'm no one.
I'm Kilgore Trout.
I am nada.
I am not Taylor Swift or Elon Musk or Courtney Love or Trump
or Bondi Barbie or Julia Roberts or Drew Barrymore.
I do not count.
This isn't a poem. I'll never put this in a manuscript.
I'll never spit this into a microphone.
I'm just adding this to the archives for anyone to read.
Hello anyone. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello.
I was working as a hostess at Riscky's Barbecue in downtown Fort Worth.
I saw Kurt Cobain on the suspended television above the bar.
I saw the gun.
I listened to "Nevermind" on repeat for three days and sobbed.
I thought he and Courtney were some kind of Gen X fairy tale.
I watched the documentaries.
I couldn't believe the woman who sang "Doll Parts" 
could kill the man who sang "Aneurysm."
Nothing added up.
Nothing made sense.

Now it's 2026 and roosters are crowing and Saturn and Neptune
are in Aries and I wore camo leggings to the hair salon yesterday
without thinking about it. This is war.
I know things now at 52 almost 53
that I never could have imagined in 1994.
Courtney killed Kurt.
The CIA killed Sharon Tate and JFK and a lot of other people
I've never heard about.
No celebrity can be trusted, not even your precious Sean Penn.
Bill Maher can mock.
I can't believe I ever had sexual fantasies about that scum.
Being an unwoke liberal doesn't make you fuckworthy.
"Believe in me," Billy Corgan sings.
I cannot.
"I just believe in me. Yoko and me. And that's reality."
John Lennon still sings in my dreams.
He was an asshole to Julian and he was wrong about a lot of things
but I would have been an asshole to Julian, too, and I've been
wrong about too many things to count.
2026 is about the counting.
2026 is about being accountable.
If you like fucking kids own that shit.
You don't have to play patty cake on some fantasy island.
Tweet that shit.
Write a book of poems about it.
No more sugar dusted skeletons bulging in walk-in closets.
If you like fucking kids maybe put a gun in your mouth
and say, "Jesus forgive me" so you won't go to hell
then kill yourself.
Oh. You're Catholic.
Well then light a million candles and go hide in a cave somewhere.
Stroke your cock and think of Shirley Temple.
Whatever the fuck gets you through the creamed corn night.

Boomer America is no mas, hoss.
Oh those Halycon Days of key parties
on Saturday night and Church of Christ on Sunday!
Block party barbecues, booming the greatest hits
of the Beach Boys and the Eagles,
Mrs. White winking at Mr. Green over vodka slushies.
Hush hush hush.
No one will ever find us out.
We can do whatever the hell we want, baby.
Jesus forgives all.
Oh those quaint photo albums proving how good we look
on picnics and those Disney vacations!
Look away! Look away!
Look away, Dixie Land.
Look in the mirror and see Marcia Brady.
Look in the mirror and see Doris Day.
Retiring from the factory at fifty, playing golf in Palm Springs.
Strippers jumping out of birthday cakes.
Wow. The nostalgia.
A new day has dawned, baby doll.
Bye bye Miss American Pie.
Hello dystopia.
Welcome to hell.
Be exactly who you are.
You will be found out.
You will be counted.
You will be assessed.
You will be measured.
Hell is here. Heaven is here.
You don't have to die to get there.
Boo. You're God.
Boo. You're Jesus.
Boo. You're Satan.
Boo. You're the devil's favorite demons.
You might be every angel dancing on the head of a pin.

"My baby loves me. I'm so happy. Happy makes me a modern girl."

I love that I can sing it without irony.
I love that I am finally home,
so austere in these ashes.
I was born for this.