Live Nude Poems

doomed love songs baudelaire you died at 46 & i feel guilty b/c i’m 51 now why should i live longer than a beautiful dark giant? maybe living longer isn’t so great especially if yr a failure like myself living in a busted dungeon alone baudelaire there are so many cigarette burns in this carpet like the fossils of fallen black stars i count them over & over but still can’t sleep the windows are falling out of their rotted sills i stub my insomniac toes on broken tiles in the sleepless dark the cat is sleeping in the window tho the moon light a ghostly second coat every decrepit window is magic w/ her in it baudelaire i’d give you my five years if i could just to see another poem of yrs you lovely green haired dandy of doom i feel guilty for walking about on the planet while my idols are mere dust baudelaire i smoked outside before while october crickets sang for love last week i read their amorous songs attract parasitic flies tho ...

the dark core of everything as a boy i remember watching my mother peel potatoes w/ a knife the way she held the blade the way her thin wrist turned & how she took just the right amount of flesh off & dug out spots of rot saving the most pathetic potatoes & how clean they all looked in the colander beneath the faucet & then decades later i remember how she got sick but still insisted on cooking & burned a pot on the stove after she passed out on the floor in the den & how i wished it was simple that i could’ve taken a knife shaved away the tumor cut out all of those terrible multiplying dark eyes until everything was clean again rob plath writes like a velociraptor is behind his back. he loves cats & the moon. find more of his work at robplath.com  

the mover i dreamt my mother was helping me carry her own coffin to the cemetery strangely, she was both inside & outside of the box she was so calm for a while i doubted she knew who we were planting in the ground but after a considerable amount of steps i was certain she recognized her own weight yet it was as if she was the mover of a piece of furniture & not her own pallbearer peaceful as if she were merely rearranging a space— perhaps moving a large cedar chest for fresh linens from one room to the next Rob Plath is a writer from New York. He is most known for his monster collection  A BELLYFUL OF ANARCHY (epic rites press 2009). His newest collection is MY SOUL IS A BROKEN DOWN VALISE (epic rites press 2019). You can see more of his work at  robplath.com

you dream yr mother’s alive again & yr both discussing her death.  in the dream, the dead version’s in the cemetery like in real life & the alive version sits at the kitchen table w/you. the alive version is trying to ease yr grief. she keeps telling you not to dwell on the dead version. it’s strange tho b/c the alive version isn’t bothered at all by the dead version.  the alive version only thinks of you.  you both continue into the wee hours of the night.  when you awake in the morning, the mid-September light is shining.  you jump up & make green tea & open the kitchen window.  the breeze presses thru the mesh, generously filling the little room. Rob Plath is a 47-year-old poet from New York. He has over a dozen books out. He is most known for his collection A BELLYFUL OF ANARCHY (epic rites press). He lives alone with his cat and stays out of trouble. See more of his work at  www.robplath.com

my father prided himself on being a thug, a leg breaker, a thief whose every third word was cunt or motherfucker & usually aimed at his own family but he wouldn't allow his 12-year-old son to have a miniature swiss army knife i remember he grabbed it from my hands & kept it himself in the drawer w/ other larger knives & a pistol i loved the knife back then the way it snapped in & out of its thin bed but when i grew older & disinterested in knives & bb guns i found i possessed another kind of edge passed down to me thru the centuries a beautiful blade sheathed in the skull which grows sharper & sharper & never is in need of the grindstone Rob Plath is a 46-year-old poet from New York. He has over a dozen books out. He is most known for his collection A BELLYFUL OF ANARCHY (epic rites press). He lives alone with his cat and stays out of trouble. See more of his work at http://www.robplath.com .