2026, everyday words, Ohio River Valley Literature, poetry, the no-scape

The neanderthal finds scrap paper and loathing

Is this what a bird feels like remembering how to fly? Is this what a fish feels like remembering how to swim?

Jimi Hendrix on the cassette, pencil in hand, coffee and an apple. Organizing (or shuffling through distraction, depending on your point of view) I found the draft of an old story,  “Bump” based on a relationship that ended a long, long time ago, when I lived in Lexington, Kentucky. She once called me “a neanderthal with a college degree.” This was her way of getting in the last word before she went to find one of her long time fuck buddies who was also in a relationship. I remember thinking that since her version of culture included screwing all of my friends, I was fine with being a neanderthal. 

After a while wandering my mind’s geography turns sour and when I look outward, some shit bag has littered the landscape and left it to me to clean it up.

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