Inferno (2006)

& when you finally touch down
____________________-in hell
____________(no red carpet)
_________the coffee’s gonna need to be strong.
Hungover-horny & (shit!) your sunglasses
_______-left at home in a jacket pocket.
Of all the things to be without...
Sterling Morrison, Joey Ramone & Ray Charles
smarter men than you (on this score)
____-look godlike standing round in shades
______(still!)
The future’s so bright, etc.
It's funny, Lucifer’s looking a lot
like Danny Tenaglia these days.
Guess he’s always hoarded the killer tunes.
______________________-Had them all
back at the tree, in snaketime. Brokered ever since.
So here’s the rub:
there’s drugs everywhere
but no painkillers
or sleepers.
_____-Figure pretty quick that you won’t
be sleeping ‘til… who knows…
Judgement?
____-But by then your bender will’ve
gathered such momentum that
you’ll’ve forgotten everything
important – even what they say
about the wicked. Anyway, it’s true. And
_____________-they're out of ice.


A version of this poem was published in mad swirl, October 2009.

Notes: Sterling Morrison played guitar in The Velvet Underground.

Danny Tenaglia is a New York-based DJ known for his marathon stints behind the decks (20 hour sets are not unusual for him). Check out this YouTube clip if you'd like to see what he looks like.

Below: In the Inferno by Mehmet Urgut (from deviantart)