We Know the Results 

The Super Bowl is Over

and with it, speculation
as pros and amateurs alike
call in to collect their bets.

The Super Bowl is Over

and you’re all a little drunk and
mentioning your friends in Philly
and considering more cocaine
or maybe fighting the bartender.

The Super Bowl is Over

I need to leave this shouting neighborhood.

The Super Bowl is Over

bartenders prepare for another
downturn and hope to live off
these profits at least until Saint Patrick’s day.

The Super Bowl is Over

and it is time to sort my w2s.

The Super Bowl is Over

and Dad’s best friend, laid to rest
at the Rainier Beach Mortuary in
a two hour ceremony.
My sister texting tears that
she can’t make it out.
My Mom’s dove, family pet for
thirteen years shivering in it’s blanket?
then still.

The Super Bowl is Over

and seriously fuck that one quarterback,
and his voting record.. We
can taste his tears from TV screens.

The Super Bowl is Over

and all the news is bad again,
no ribbing between headlines
the anchors all look scared
or drugged.

The Super Bowl is Over

and there are buses I no longer take
pictures I’m wiping from my phone
breakfast spots that sting in memory
a line around the block
for a play I now won’t see
and a Cat I’ll never pet again.

The Super Bowl is Over

which means there must be winners
but I am more concerned with losses now;
I mean

I even bought a suit.

All Star Apology Tour

These are feathers we punch all night. Wait!
memory foam not made for sleeping,
A twenty minute ambulance ride,
A room constructed entirely of half-drank
bloody marias, congealed, separating.
The shirt that is not a shirt. The punch that is
not a punch, constant redrafting of late scripts.

Requests on the rider: A podium, a thesaurus, a variety
of casual hats to cast a shade over what I’m about to say:

I don’t regret a thing!
I am sorry for everything.

Especially the time I asked about the veracity
of the chip bowl by saying “snackurate.”
This is not a way to live with dignity, no
eeking a 1,000 pager out of these follies; I try
so hard to recast this as literature. Snow-torn
epics! The spanning! THE SPANNING! Where
is my velour bathrobe?! There are no tiger faces
on these slippers. Watch my final gambit.
For forgiveness

I slide across the waxed mahogany floor
howling quotes from all the great Russians.

Putin and Smirnov, mainly.