Get Us Out of Here

The roaches crawl through the employee lounge

as we wait on invisible checks
to spend on starving children
and cheap wine

I find my comfortable place by the fan
and pop a Xanax

daydream I’m a jetsetter
popular with the natives
of every island

I’m halfway there
wearing no underwear

the quarters in my pocket
for ramen
instead of laundry

Anna
I want to take you
on a kitchen counter
and pretend it’s a balcony in Barcelona

we’re halfway there
as my AC struggles

as we do
folding clothes
tearing tickets

we’re halfway there

but the landlord’s
always waiting at the end

our island fades into a bedroom
our balcony fades into a twin bed

we fall asleep

broke
and dreaming

© 2010 Lee Kitzis

Alone in a Conference Room on a Sunday Afternoon

I spilled ramen on my lap

Hung over and too tired to do anything about it
I looked at it

It looked like someone blew their brains out
all over my khakis

Then I looked up

There was no god there to tell me why

Just a cheap cardboard ceiling

and 4 hours left on the clock

it was a quiet
little suicide

© 2009 Lee Kitzis

On Being a Poet

When you’re a kid
on Saturday afternoon
your lunch
is probably something like
a salami sandwich
and Spaghettios

and when you’re an adult
it’s pretty much the same
except it’s dinner
Thursday
at 10:30 p.m.

and your milk
is a can
of cheap beer
like High Life
or Old Style

make that a few glasses of milk

and you work tomorrow
instead of school

you finished school
long ago
and realized
most of it’s
bullshit

you wanted to be
an astronaut when
you grew up

and now
you’re all grown up
and serving the astronauts
chocolate-covered truffles
and gummi fruit salad

I was a kid
until I picked up “HOWL”
and that made me want to be a poet

So this bowl of Ramen’s for you
Ginsberg

You fucking asshole

© 2008 Lee Kitzis