Motherfucker (A Poem)

Motherfuckers
don’t know
they’re motherfuckers
that’s why
they’re motherfuckers

A few
are lucky enough
to look in the mirror
at their motherfuckin’ face
and go my god
what have I motherfuckin’ done?
I’ve been a motherfucker
this whole time

but most
go on bein’ motherfuckers

Some stay small
bein’ motherfuckers in customer service lines
a fistful of expired coupons for another store

Some rise to the heights of motherfuckery
and become president of the motherfuckers
MFOTUS

There are motherfuckers in Brazil
There are motherfuckers in the states
There are motherfuckers in France eating pasteurized cheese

There are Yanomami motherfuckers
There are Inuit motherfuckers
There are motherfuckers in lost tribes in the Kalahari
they send out for water and that come back with a handful
of rocks someone told them they were magical
and could produce water and the elders the women
the children the camels all go

This motherfucker

You see
a motherfucker isn’t a swear word

It’s a state of mind

It sets off fireworks at 3 AM in December

It doesn’t wipe the stationary bike at the gym down
when it’s done with it

It blames Mexicans instead of banks

It cages children

It steals from charity

It’s in the White House

eatin’ a cheeseburger
in a tanning bed

like a little bitch

© 2019 Lee Kitzis

New Book!

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The new book of poetry from Lee Kitzis! That's me!

No more readin' poems on the computer for you! You're reading poems on paper! Like the professor of a fancy college! Or a college drop-out with a book! Whichever!

Coming Soon...

October Magic

When people tell me
baseball bores them

I understand

Ours is a secret society
we have our own language
spoken over pitchers of Old Style in bars
in our den 3 Bloody Marys in

it is the poetry of math

from the traditional verse
of AVG and HRs

to the scat
of sabermetrics

when the pitcher talks
into his glove

you read it in the catcher's nod

and when it works

it's glorious

and never thrown
down the center of the plate

we're a strange breed
brushing the corners

When people tell me baseball bores them

I understand

© 2013 Lee Kitzis

Wednesday ramble

mind-meltingly bored. burnt myself out on internet poker. only so many times i can have a fat nerd or zit-faced 18-year-old suck out against me to a beach scene back-drop before i look for something else to do. have a staker but the casinos are so damn far away and the weather is shit. don't know how i'm gonna pay rent. don't care. don't feel like writing poetry right now. almost never feel like reading it. the magazines are filled with guys named raymond. poets are obsessed with changing the world with introspective bullshit. everyone's trying to keep their bank account from being overdrawn. verse about your feelings on water with a french symbolist quote in the beginning just isn't gonna do it guys. sorry. one of the main problems with poetry is the reliance on metaphor. just say it assholes. most poets just fart out a metaphor here and a metaphor there. it should be used sparingly. it's like meeting someone for the first time. they start telling you a story. a good story's a good story. it'll engross you as is. if it's some guy throwing metaphors at you you're just gonna mace him in the face and be on your merry way. it happens every day in new york, london, chicago. he falls to the ground. he rubs his eyes. his conclusion: "they didn't get it." sorry. that's a metaphor.

For Dan, Lindsey, and Brian

The pretty Hungarian girls bundled up at Hollywood Grill
the Czech bars are empty
and the hostels dark

I’ve got work tomorrow

‘cus poetry only pays the printer

but I have my friends
and my pinto beans

so that counts for something

but not much

since this is a short poem

and I forgot to buy tortillas

© 2008 Lee Kitzis

Monday Morning and it's Still all the Same

I woke up
to the sound of Chan Marshall

orthopedic heat pads on the floor
books of poetry
and used cognac bottles

the dust bunnies collecting like armies
and my stomach’s in pain

four new gray hairs

and no love for months

I feel sorry
for the people with bibles under their arms

the grocery store clerk

and the Yellow Cab driver
with a gun to his head

the birds that taunt the insomniacs

and the ones that have slept for 8 hours
but are tired for reasons
they can’t understand

and I don’t either

and we never will

last night
I dreamt I lost the dog
of a woman I love
but could not tell

We were in the city
and he was gone

but she didn’t care

then I woke up
Monday morning
to the sound of Chan Marshall

and it was a very good song

for all of us

© 2008 Lee Kitzis

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

Constipated in Gobles, Michigan

I was constipated for more than a week
and I figured if anything was going to cure it
it would be Gobles, Michigan

so I took the Outlaw Bible of American Poetry to my parents’ country washroom

and read pretentious beats
dull surrealists
and whiney NY punks

hoping that would get my bowels going

still nothing

so I looked out the window
at the flowers
and the dragonflies
and the trees
and tried
some sort of know-nothing
Zen will
on the Hot Pocket
from last Sunday

just farts and “outlaw” poetry

finally giving up and accepting my fate

to be one of many poets to have died filled with his own shit

I dog-eared Corso

and called it a day

© 2008 Lee Kitzis