Evidence of Common Descent Two Prose Poems by Howie Good

Evidence of Common Descent

Now that we have moved the clocks ahead, I keep glancing around for the inevitable beggar. Good thing you aren’t here. The clouds resemble moldy photographs of potbellied pink cherubs. I have never seen that before. God’s own son must be stuck at Customs in a railway station near the border. It’s been that kind of day. Hipsters have issued a manifesto. “No more manifestos!” it simply states. Perhaps this is what I deserve, orphaned rabbit kits, hairless and blind, born under a forlorn bush in a far corner of evening.

Pervs

The doomsday clock advances to three minutes to midnight. You pull the cushions off the couch, the books off the shelves, try to pull up the floorboards with your bare hands. I should leave. It doesn’t feel safe. Hijacked flights sail off the edge of the sky. Then again, lost pets and missing children are continually arriving from all directions. Given how much is going on, I never get a moment to ask the question I want to ask. There’s barely time left for dirty movies to be shown in seedy theaters.

Howie Good is a recipient of the 2015 Press Americana Prize for Poetry for his latest collection, Dangerous Acts Starring Unstable Elements.