To the Artist's Page                    To our home page

To Jonathan Penton's previous piece     To Jonathan Penton's next piece

Don’t Let Me Give You a Title

There’s a bearded man stretched naked
across the foyer floor
and you realized you’ve reached a place you’ve
only read about
in weird fiction
and the biographies of the mad

You move smoothly, easily
among these addled minds
taking in amusement
drinking of their separate ecstasies.
There’s blood and puke on the walls.

Coke on every mirror
Pills in every couch.
It’s not a party here until somebody’s dead.
Platypus women and weasel men
dressed not fashionably, nor like rejects
dressed like they can’t quite clothe themselves at all
match their sense with their socks.
Separate from society, they have no
need to rebel;
Too close to the source of empathy
they’ve lost the ability to sense
any mind but their own,
collective,
unconsciousness…

A lesser extrovert would be terrified
but you feel more you than ever:
this is a fantasy you never quite
understood you had.
You hold your liquor
and your water
long after your host is past
passing
Here, style and grace
the only virtues you’ve known
are the only measure of a man

And the less real your surroundings
the more real you seem
as seeing is always believing
and what is believed
will always be seen

One woman in particular
loves to hear your warless words.
You grease the thighs between her eyes
and watch her skin twitch slightly
under the weight of your
superior, selfish logic.
You let her wrap herself
into the shapes you want her to need
and as her moments come to a head
you see a subtle sign--
before unnoticed--
flashing in the corner:

Do not tease the animals.

Do not tease the animals.

Although they are not capable of making threats…

This is not a request.

To the top of this page