For Erik and Courtney

I once called you the worst Buddhist ever

and I meant it
in the best possible way

it’s Thanksgiving
and I’m working

surrounded by weird Europeans Koreans the suicidal
Gary, Indiana’s finest drive-in accidents in Wal-Mart jeans

thinking of your limitless compassion

and being thankful for that

and Courtney’s limitless patience

which you should be thankful for

because there are not many girls

that would see a 6-ft-6 Danish Buddhist

w/ nothing on
but a dirty bathrobe
and a beer in hand

and stick around

but w/ Jesus in her heart
and a couple screwdrivers
she did

for 3 years

and then she married you

so this Thanksgiving

I say hallelujah for you Courtney

and hallelujah for you Erik

and hallelujah for you Jesus, Allah, Buddha, Todd
whatever your name is

you work in mysterious ways

© 2009 Lee Kitzis

Poem Written After Smoking a Strong Italian Cigar Too Fast

i took a rocket to the moon
and ended up in gary, indiana

while the homicides homicided

and the poets poeted

bill kurtis read bedtime stories to the president

while jesus snuck out the backdoor

hauled ass to canada
to get his ulcer checked out

i took a rocket to the moon
and ended up tossing ice into a denny’s urinal
at 2:03 a.m.
thankful for work

i took a rocket to the moon

and ended up on the moon

and it was nice

there were no poets

or homicides

just jesus

hiding behind a rock

“that guy scares the shit out of me” he said

“plus it’s a little cold”

i agreed

then the earth blew up
in the name of god

and i poeted this poem about it

© 2008 Lee Kitzis

When I Die I'll Have to File for Unemployment

Not much to do at work
so I wikipediad Pablo Picasso and Babe Ruth
while the pickpockets and Gary, Indiana moms
with Marlboro Menthol faces and diabetic ugly kids
waddled through the human heart exhibit and Toy Maker factory

the more they believe in God
the uglier they get

Babe Ruth was skinny
and Pablo Picasso was a Communist

Grand Canyon Adventure lets out
the families make their way towards the astronauts

Christ be with you I think

and turn off the computer

I wish I was a trust fund kid

© 2008 Lee Kitzis

snot n' haiku stuffins

Sorry 'bout the hiatus folks. You'll be happy to know I have my own internet connection now. No more masturbating at the window for this guy!
Lessee, what's new. Have a murderous cold. As a result, on just a few hours of sleep. Kids coughing in my face all day long will do that.
Me and Kid Douche went to the Horseshoe on Sunday. It's relatively new but it is in the Hammond, Indiana area. So give it a year til it looks like shit. My only real complaint is that everything's on one floor and the poker room is all the way in the back. So you have to walk through an abyss of slot sleeze and ugly cocktail waitresses before you make it there. The poker room was nice though. Tall ceilings and done up in an old-west motif.
Played the 3/6 limit game and finished ahead about 15 bucks. Which means after the rake and tips I broke even. Yay. But hey, that's casino poker.
Keeping with the haiku theme, here're two of my faves:

Even at the time
When my father lay dying
I still kept farting.

-Yamazaki Sokan (1464-1552)

My span of years
Today appears
A morning-glory's hour.

-Arkida Moritake (1472-1549)

Your sickly Jew -Lee

Poetry and Poker

While smokestacks fart in Hammond, Indiana

a gambler gets busted on the nut flush

Looking at my typewriter
with dust-bunnies in its crevices
a busted M key
a missing =+ key
she’s been good to me

so I try anyway

it’ll get me more broke than laid

He buys in for another hand

be good to me he begs

while the old black men in fedoras
the Chinese ATMs
the old Jewish pros
the Italian contractors

people from all over the map

wait for their table

The good ones know

you gotta wait for it

The bad ones
force it

and get something like this

© 2008 Lee Kitzis

The Girl at the Hollywood Grill at 6 A.M.

She said
she was from Munster, Indiana

and people don’t treat
each other
like this
in Munster, Indiana

and
it was her 21st birthday

how could we

and I
wanted to tell her
about the powder blue
stuffed dog
I found
laying dead
and dirty
in the middle
of the subway tracks

and my weeks
of not eating

but Steve
just gave her
his finished plate
and said
“Happy Birthday.”

that poor girl
from the Midwest

drunk

in Chicago

© 2008 Lee Kitzis

New Employee Orientation or How I Came to Hate the Name Heather

The meeting for new employees was in the Columbian Room of the Museum of Science and Industry

A sexless conference area that would make the perfect place for a clerk or receptionists suicide

Tapioca walls and a dirty brown floral carpet

There was coffee and it counted as work
so even after staying up all night drinking Evan Williams
and watching a Chapelle’s Show marathon I went

I was the only one from the Omnimax theatre section of the museum
my usual crowd of cynical college kids and single moms and dads that had it tough but still smiled

The crowd for the orientation was comprised almost entirely of members of the facilitators section which meant they were all bad actors and closet-sized theatre directors that needed a day job

There is nothing worse on this planet than being hung-over and stuck in a conference room full of actors

The overflamboyant noise did not mix well with the sterile atmosphere and it made my headache worse

The speakers took turns talking about payroll and fire-exit safety as if the Gods were listening

after four hours of presentations
it was time for the scavenger hunt

we divided up into groups and were all given packets with 25 fill-in-the-blank questions dealing with the museum exhibits

First one back with all the questions answered got a food voucher good for one cafeteria meal

As my group walked by the El exhibit I had visions of throwing myself on the tracks and being run over by a ghost train

Two women led the group

one was a petite blonde very pretty with a gorgeous ass that looked like it never saw the mattress as she slept and was methodically paraffin waxed every morning

she had short hair and ran ahead with the other girl
an obnoxious redhead who you could tell took everything about acting seriously except the talent part and had visions of that room temperature spaghetti already in her head

I suspected the blonde was just feigning interest as an excuse to stay ahead of the rest of the group as she was creeped out (and rightfully so) by the haggard looking Jew with a five o’ clock shadow the quiet fat guy and the effeminate black guy in a lab coat following her

the ladies shouted out the answers and I pretended to write them down
not wanting to be blamed for costing us our cafeteria coupons

When we returned we had lost by a long shot
and as the actors talked I played cell-phone poker

six hours later and we were barely half-way through the presenters

I got up to go to the washroom and when I came back I could hear maniacal laughter and crying as I approached the conference room door

I opened the door
and it was group activity w/ Heather
Heather was the kind of person that assumed talking loud and being overzealous passed as entertainment simply because it worked on people that went to see Indiana rowboat shows and took their kids to the Dells

while everyone was in a circle role-playing I inched over to the table where I hung my head and tried to remain unnoticed

then Heather led the gang back to the table where she pointed at a screen and yelled some more

after a few minutes of Heather’s blonde amphetamine frenzy she asked everyone to get back up and move back into a circle

one kid finally snapped and threw his glasses against the table

three others moaned

this was more than seven hours later
I had had enough

I asked the HR person leading the group and who’d had enough too if I could go I had a train to catch

he instantly knew that I was full of shit smiled and said yes you can

I hiked out of the conference room and up the stairs
Heather being Heather echoing in the distance

on my way to the train stop I saw the same old disheveled and hunch-backed homeless black guy I see on Cornell and 57th everyday

he looked like he wasn’t getting any change

we would both need some hair of the dog that night

© 2008 Lee Kitzis