My dead best friend by Mike Zone

Amongst the devastation

we sat on the floor

passing the bottle back and forth like dead poets pretending to live beat

reading Rumi, Sexton, Dickensen, Ginsberg and Hughes

the furniture stolen

everything of value gone

except the books

the books no one cared about

speaking volumes

the shy boy from the bookstore looked at me longingly with a look of concern

eager for a sense of hope

after my rant on death-culture

Mike Zone

are these the books

we're going to use

to rebuild society

I took a swig and sighed

damned if I knew

then there was a beautiful moment tragic communal silence

of course my fat oaf of a best friend ruined it all

pretending to be intelligent

who had prevented me from hanging myself two days before

asked in his eastern european accent...

Michael, what is the most psychological text, you've ever read?

he's dead

that's it

so many memories

and this is the one that sticks out

maybe it's because we were all so fucking high and nearly pissed ourselves laughing

Mike Zone is the Editor in Chief of Dumpster Fire Press, the author of Fuck You: A Fucking Poetry Chap, Shedding Dark Places (almost), One Hell of a Muse , as well as coauthor of The Grind. A frequent contributor to Alien Buddha Press and Mad Swirl. His work has been featured in: Horror Sleaze Trash, Better Than Starbucks, Piker Press, Punk Noir Magazine, Synchronized Chaos, Outlaw Poetry and Cult Culture magazine.