A Cold Bastard

The poison lingers on my lips
like salivation, uncontrolled,
and waiting to ruin everyone’s day.

I get it from my dad, I say,
which certainly isn’t a lie.
But really, ugliness is me,

as near the Divine as I get.
Some people reach it perfectly,
projecting only thoughts and deeds

to make an angel blush
redder than a teenager,
on watching with his parents that

scene in the movie where
the leads take off their clothes.
That isn’t me.

Sarcasm, and bitterness,
the lowest form of wit:
that’s me.

My dad’s an Enfant Terrible
even in his latter years.
Without ever meaning to be,

his words are like thumbscrews,
cat o’nines, and other such playthings
with which to sing the blues

in tones of cackling laughter.
Paraphilia, divorce, crimes of war
and wretched hate, the broken whore

of life in all its vicious modes...
it’s always, always ripe for jokes.
And I don’t want to be a cold,

offensive, mean bastard
(given that bastards don’t have dads
and mine, however flawed, will do).

I’d like to be a comfort and a joy.
But sheer grotesquerie can be
its own strange alchemy,

and we don’t notice flowers less,
nor turn away from art,
just because the cut of our jib

is lined with razorblades.