THREE POEMS BY KATHLEEN M CRANE

Grand Mackerel Spa and Resort

Futuristic black hole
Abysmal abyss
Soulless asylum
Orwellian oasis
Cultural vacuum
Embryonic iron shell
Mannequin mausoleum
Hellacious hotel.

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Grand Mackerel Spa and Resort 2

Pre-fab flab floating flotsam hotel pool
Blank faced guests spoon their morning gruel
Evening drunks form a fluorescent queue
Craft designer drinks served by a skeleton crew
Mirthless grins light dim empty faces
Labyrinth of vacant rooms with no human traces
Pint glasses clink with a hollow sound
Here’s to burning this fucking hotel to the ground.

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You Don’t Stand a Chance

Hormone injected, monster-sized fast foods
Multi-colored pills to improve your mood
Smart phones alert with a “ding”
Drooling Pavlov dog underlings

You don’t stand a chance.

Parade of orange cones on every city street
Gas station pump TV’s
Communist McDonald’s–a fresh new look
Kindles and tablets instead of books

You don’t stand a chance.

Do the opioid shuffle, it’s the latest craze
5 Hour Energy brings you out of your haze
Don the baby rompers, go see a flick
Another Marvel movie, you can take your pick

You don’t stand a chance.

There are no Beatle records
There are no Shakespeare plays
Van Gogh’s in the asylum
Hemingway’s in AA

Millennial generation
Government subsidized
Disability applications
Before you learn to drive

Six o’clock the Fear Report
An hour of Two Minute Hate
Trump is our Goldstein
A bad comb over our fate

You don’t stand a chance.

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Kathleen Marie Crane is co-editor at New Pop Lit. Her ebook of short stories, Aloha From Detroit, is available here.