The Iliad By Justin Karcher

       Thomas Hawk Flickr


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The Iliad

Almost last call outside the Pink
a young woman is yelling at these bros
“You and a bunch of your friends
ran train on me
I’ll never forget your nose…”

the bouncer with his chest puffed out
asks her to leave or he’ll call the cops
I tell the bouncer she did nothing wrong
he tells me to keep walking
to mind my business

now everyone’s laughing at the girl
she disappears into shadows cast by dead trees
tonight all the imperialist douchebags are
getting drunk on international microbrews
scooping up Rosetta Stones
mistranslating careless whispers

like that time
Cassandra rejects Apollo
so he spits in her mouth
he curses her to proclaim
truths no one believes

the sun causes cancer
Apollo’s still alive
let’s carjack his golden chariot
let’s drive it into the water

but now it’s morning
I’m sitting on the steps of
the Albright-Knox Art Gallery
some teens who’ve been up all night are
drinking from a growler of paint thinner

I imagine a world where
retired Instagram models
take up gardening
planting words in the war-torn ground
hoping one day
there’ll be giant hashtags
looming over us all
so we pay more attention

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Justin Karcher is a poet and playwright born and raised in Buffalo, New York. He is the author of Tailgating at the Gates of Hell (Ghost City Press, 2015), the chapbook When Severed Ears Sing You Songs (CWP Collective Press, 2017), the micro-chapbook Just Because You've Been Hospitalized for Depression Doesn't Mean You're Kanye West (Ghost City Press, 2017), Those Who Favor Fire, Those Who Pray to Fire (EMP, 2018) with Ben Brindise, and Bernie Sanders Broke My Heart and I Turned into an Iceberg (Ghost City Press, 2018). He is also the editor of Ghost City Review and co-editor of the anthology My Next Heart: New Buffalo Poetry (BlazeVOX [books], 2017). He tweets @Justin_Karcher

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