Incineration Day Poem by Julia Luber

Oh God. I'm hot and bothered beyond me. The sweat is running down
my face and under my boobs and making a mess of my long sleeved
hoodie t-shirt. And what am I doing wearing long sleeves on an incineration
day like this? A t-shirt with a hoodie? You'd think I'd just be thrilled to have
that casual dude comfort throwback latitude to Malibu feel. But this murder
this DA in LA committed of his family just the other day is on the steal. Geeze,
and down the street. So near, please. I suppose I'm not the only one in fear.
And is a DA who is a killer a step up to a cop who is a killer? That's what I've
been dealing with- oh, Lord, what a thriller. But day rolls into day and night
is a sun that has been soaked in black and eternal blood becoming all the sky.
There never were murders in this valley when I was a child, and now there
seems to be at least two or three a week, and I'm wondering why. I can't believe
what's become of this place. As I shove away my boobs and wipe the sweat off
my face. I can't believe this is where life used to be so fuckin' cool. When I was
a child and over the whole playground I did kinda rule. But we all did. And we
were all living the life. We had clergy on the playground stomping hats to make
husband and wife. We had sports teams that played football named ourselves
the Gods and the Lords. And Gina Gershon was indeed the fox of the school
and over all of us here swaggering long hair and attitude NEVER made us bored.
And we had feathered hair and combs in our back pockets and skateboards.
And did strange girl rituals in the bathroom on the ceiling were our wet towels moored.
And played seven minutes in heaven and spin the bottle, things like that.
And never thought it took killing one's family to make a city DA feel like a fat cat.