bienvenue (a poem)

by Peter Erich


if you lost your list on your way here

i will help you get what you came for.

a fabric that holds its weight, waders

to fish for baubles, noisemakers that

can knock all the boys from their feet,

and these things will be yours alone.


but you sigh. you sigh, and you say

my effort just isn't good enough, and

in one infinite exhale of expectations

i become small and burrow into myself,

quietly raging like a boobytrap.

and it happens again, and again, and it

builds, and it will become more. it will

be louder, and it will be brightly colored

and "it" will become "i" and i will be the

master of ceremonies describing what

is about to go down.


it will start with a song and it will end

with a traffic jam and i will never again be less,

and i will pose in the center of the freeway

and i will walk-off conquering;

for me, safe behind the sandbags, alone,

drinking what i came for, as the bombs go off.