Beach Sloth

                Green diesel buses bring him to his destination. Buses are the most EMO form of public transportation. Everyone is sad on a bus. Nobody talks. Silence rules. I have heard the driver say on long bus rides to ‘keep conversation at a minimum, keep the phone calls short’. They enjoy the silence. Looking out the window of a bus is a different feeling from a train. A train feels positive. Buses are a step back. 

                Television crews love insanity. People like to see the mad from far away. Up close terrifies them. Distance anesthetizes the awfulness. One can say ‘Oh that’s terrible’ or ‘Oh that’s a shame’ without feeling the slightest need to help. Botany made his home a marble for it to be flicked around channel surfers’ minds. Television is entertainment for lazy blobs. Ask Slimer of ‘Ghostbusters’ fame. SIimer loves TV as he drinks Ectocooler remembering better times. 

                Floorboards clap under our feet. We think they are squeaking but no. The squeaks of the floorboards are applause. Hear the squeaks and know your home loves you. It approves of your movement and return back to it. Your home wants you to be there forever to keep it company. When we leave home the home is sad. It wonders if it’ll be like the rest of the homes, settling down and empty from 9 to 5 on weekdays. 

                Bros are American beefcakes. Bros hate art more than the Dadaists. At night they drive cars at unreasonable speeds for entertainment purposes only. Without those machines they would have little interaction with the rest of the world. They want to pass by the world quickly because they are deeply self-absorbed. Unfortunately due to their lack of self-awareness they will never realize the level of self-absorption. Bros are the original Bounty the quilted quicker-picker upper. Muscles deflect any attempt at socializing outside of the bro-o-sphere. 

                Gobi nightlife is fierce. Bhutan is banging at the top of the world. We have many friends we used to know. They get away from us or we get away from them. Original pleasures like cigarette smoke remind not of a youth culture but of a stale culture. Nothing changes. It remains the same. This is when you leave forever, drive away, and find a far off place to start life anew. 

                Photos adorn nearly every page. They are beautiful, somewhat sad pictures of a realistic city, devoid of the hallmarks of Gentrification. Rather they are deliberately picked to give a sense of geography to each poem. Feel the effects of living in a place you’ve never been. That is what Justin does with these poems, each one conveying a sense of quiet urban neurosis.