Poetry: Selections From Ben Newell
Honey, I’m Home
Living
with my
81-year-old mother,
my
expenses next to nothing,
I am no
longer a wage slave;
for the
first time in my adult life
I am
actually saving money,
socking it
away, for what I have
a pretty
good idea, one of those
high-end
sex dolls customized
to my
exacting specifications;
I will
keep her under my bed,
hidden
behind the dust ruffle,
pull her
out late at night when
my mother
is asleep, my deaf
mother who
can’t hear a word
when I
come home from work
and tell
her about my day.
Dipshit
I’m
driving to an interview
at the
local junior college
and
thinking about that scene
from Dazed
and Confused
when David
Wooderson,
nursing a
cold one outside
the pool
hall,
justifies
his decision to keep
working
for the city
instead of
going back to school
and
listening to some dipshit
who
doesn’t know what
in the
hell he’s talking about,
which
describes me to a tee
should the
academic dean
make the
biggest mistake
of her
professional career.
Ben
Newell lives in
Mississippi where he works as a bookseller. At fifty-four, he recently resumed
skateboarding after a lengthy hiatus.