Five Poems by J.J. Campbell

 

a blistered fucking ego

 

soft brown skin slipping

through my hands yet again

 

piss poor timing and all

the other excuses

 

i look in the mirror and

know i am to blame

 

was it fear, anger, a blistered

fucking ego or were you simply

blind to an amazing woman

that wanted to love you

 

and here you are

 

too old, too late, too far gone

to ever even get a chance

 

you remember the picture

of the muse sitting on a rock

thousands of feet in the air

 

how you always wanted

to be the one there with her

 

circumstance and piss poor

luck have ruined more than

just your life

 

she'll always be a friend

 

the one that got away

 

the one that still knows how

to raise the hair on the back

of your neck

 

maybe she will find you

on your death bed,

pen in hand

 

still writing about the most

beautiful woman in the world

the lust for gun violence

 

i never quite got the

lust for gun violence

either in real life or

even the video games

 

when we played

cowboys and indians

i was neither

 

more likely a rancher

that just wanted to be

left alone

 

and sure, i get why

people loved the

mobsters of the

early twentieth

century

 

the fresh suits, all

the liquor, plenty

of women, and

the biggest guns

 

longevity was never

part of the deal

 

i would rather like

to enjoy life instead

of constantly watching

my back

ruin me

 

the most beautiful woman

in the world laughs at the

porn i watch

 

tells me she would ruin me

if we ever got together

 

like i haven't been asking

for that for most of my life

 

but the truth hangs in the air

 

i am not someone's knight

in shining armour

 

the handsome devil they feel

lucky to still be available

 

i'm the last fuck at the bar

 

where the desperate say

 

ah, fuck it

say hello to god

 

sadness

 

the single tear

racing down

the cheek

 

there are no

words, just

silence

 

plenty of

contemplation

 

like an old movie

playing out in

front of you

 

you see her reach

for the gun and

take the safety

off

 

before reason

can enter the

room

 

she places it

against her temple

and says hello

to god

 

i guess she thought

i would be too young

to remember

 

and here we are

all these years later

 

i pour a little out for

what could have been

fishnets and a long cigarette

 

an old woman

catches my eye

 

fishnets and a

long cigarette

 

suddenly, i'm

the cool gangster

in a black and

white movie

 

and here comes

the dame trying

to ease my mind

 

we go to her room

and of course, it

was a set up

 

my rivals fill me

up with bullets

and i can still

hear her laughter

 

but man, those

legs

 

i can still imagine

those wrapped

around my head

J.J. Campbell (1976 - ?) is old enough to know better. He's been widely published over the years, most recently at Synchronized Chaos, Horror Sleaze Trash, Disturb the Universe Magazine, The Rye Whiskey Review and Carcinogenic Poetry. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)