{"id":3960,"date":"2013-06-24T08:00:37","date_gmt":"2013-06-24T08:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sporkpress.com\/?p=3960"},"modified":"2013-06-24T08:00:37","modified_gmt":"2013-06-24T08:00:37","slug":"3960","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/2013\/06\/24\/3960\/","title":{"rendered":"3 Poems || Monica McClure"},"content":{"rendered":"

ADDERALL<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

I would do addy over cocaine any day<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take a long ride on the A train snorting<\/p>\n

orange crushed time release beads<\/p>\n

This older man I dated<\/p>\n

called it his performance-enhancer<\/p>\n

When he went to lecture at a Rabbinical school in LA<\/p>\n

he let me stay in his Park Slope brownstone<\/p>\n

Thank G_d he approved of abortions<\/p>\n

I felt bad for blowing a guy on his futon<\/p>\n

during the carnival scene of The Third Man<\/p>\n

I\u2019m too young to manage a full-time sugar daddy<\/p>\n

I never saw an amphetamine I didn\u2019t like<\/p>\n

Why should I be stuck with this<\/p>\n

gentile mental process<\/p>\n

I weighed this powder on a balance<\/p>\n

Already I feel it tipping in my favor<\/p>\n

There\u2019s never been a worse poor person<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t avoid pregnancy and county jail<\/p>\n

to sound like George W. Bush<\/p>\n

I reject a language manipulated by folklore<\/p>\n

and middle class people watching ESPN<\/p>\n

I want to live in a kingdom of style and camp<\/p>\n

I want to relate this smut to Vienna after the war<\/p>\n

When finally those who really got glamour<\/p>\n

despite their abject poverty<\/p>\n

with just a little industriousness could live<\/p>\n

like movie stars in the bombed out rubble<\/p>\n

Jean Rhys up to her dimples<\/p>\n

in black market velvet, meringue, and chartreuse<\/p>\n

clouds hanging in the death sky<\/p>\n

It\u2019ll never be this good for her again<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a child who needs money in the orphanage<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

LUXE INTERIORITY<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

I was starved for love<\/p>\n

Now I\u2019ve just had an abortion<\/p>\n

It is Mercedes Benz Fashion Week<\/p>\n

but I don\u2019t want to go to the shows<\/p>\n

The social worker who performed<\/p>\n

my intake consultation looked like<\/p>\n

she lined her eyes with Kohl\u2019s<\/p>\n

I think I would like to be a part of culture<\/p>\n

While remaining without<\/p>\n

Michel Foucault says<\/p>\n

There is no such thing as outside<\/p>\n

But that\u2019s exactly<\/p>\n

Where I need this thing to be<\/p>\n

Lack, you are my lackey bitch<\/p>\n

I refuse to be stuffed full of myth<\/p>\n

I can live like a blade on surfaces<\/p>\n

W Magazine<\/p>\n

I study the wedding photos<\/p>\n

of Margaux Hemmingway and Bernard Fauchier<\/p>\n

On a poor girl her brows would look unkempt<\/p>\n

I see only what I know to be baroque<\/p>\n

the white patio furniture hot from the sun<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m a crazy witch!\u201d screams the receptionist<\/p>\n

and I\u2019m so startled I throw up my Vallium<\/p>\n

Why should \u201cI\u201d be in Massachusetts<\/p>\n

scared shitless by the symbols of other people<\/p>\n

their paranoid existences<\/p>\n

when I could be getting photographed<\/p>\n

wearing a nude bodysuit in a white room<\/p>\n

If that\u2019s what she wants to put out there, whatever<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DEAD SOULS<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n

Religious men will try to tell you<\/p>\n

that every abortion is special<\/p>\n

and to an extent I agree<\/p>\n

I was inconsolable when I missed prom<\/p>\n

I had to pay a woman to pretend<\/p>\n

to be my mother so I could<\/p>\n

obtain parental consent<\/p>\n

Every citizen of this world is on trial<\/p>\n

I\u2019m learning to speak legalese<\/p>\n

I stroll through civil law like a sample sale<\/p>\n

Kendra said she knew a doctor<\/p>\n

who would do abortions for minors<\/p>\n

as long as you didn\u2019t cry<\/p>\n

during the ultrasound<\/p>\n

I looked all over Houston for him<\/p>\n

getting fatter and richer as I went<\/p>\n

This all could have been avoided if I\u2019d<\/p>\n

convinced an over 18<\/p>\n

to sell me her birth control<\/p>\n

If my mother wasn\u2019t a Christian<\/p>\n

If the nurse hadn\u2019t insisted that Kendra<\/p>\n

swallow the morning after pill<\/p>\n

in front of her as I waited<\/p>\n

in the parking lot of TJ Max<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t my prom exactly<\/p>\n

I was a freshman invited by<\/p>\n

my upperclass boyfriend<\/p>\n

Gulp your items down<\/p>\n

the nurse had said<\/p>\n

Now that I\u2019m free I can go<\/p>\n

to the DVF party<\/p>\n

in droll East Hampton<\/p>\n

sponsored by Veuve Cliquot<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not a wise man<\/p>\n

I\u2019m too fertile for that<\/p>\n

But I can tell you that some abortions<\/p>\n

are more convenient than others<\/p>\n

and I\u2019ve taken notes on how not to be poor in soul<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013\u2013<\/p>\n

Monica McClure<\/strong>\u2019s poems have appeared in the Los Angeles Review, The Lit Review, Lambda Literary Review\u2019s Spotlight Series, Paperbag<\/em> and elsewhere. Her chapbook,\u00a0Mood Swing<\/em>, is forthcoming from Snacks Press, Inc. She curates the Atlas Reading Series and teaches at Bloomfield College. She lives in New York City.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ADDERALL \u00a0 I would do addy over cocaine any day Let\u2019s take a long ride on the A train snorting orange crushed time release beads This older man I dated called it his performance-enhancer When he went to lecture at a Rabbinical school in LA he let me stay in his Park Slope brownstone Thank […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,4,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","category-poetry","category-things"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3960\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thisissporkpress.com\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}