Haiku for Water & Main

The first thing you need
to know about any big
small mountain town is:

Don’t do cocaine in
the bathroom of the local
dive bar. It is rude

to have what others
do not, so don’t flaunt yourself
where everyone goes

to die alone in

a crowd, even though
it takes years and they pretend
they’re dead already

’cause it’s funny
to make fun of your meaningless
life by calling

it meaningless. It
kills time to sit in darkness
with others like you

(god forbid someone
new comes along, a cute blonde
one-third her size and

nine-thirds smarter than
that vicious middle-aged cunt
who holds court in all

the big small mountain
town local dive bars across
America. I’ve

seen it with my own
eyes, was that cute blonde the cunt
hated and busted

on because she was
a bully & everyone
was on her side &

wanted me dead for
breathing the air she controlled
with rumors and wrath

claiming all the cute
blondes like me were psychopaths
and liars, falling

stars who seduced dead-
beat local men. Trees that threw
shade yet bore no fruit,

never shared their coke).

Enormity: Oil on Wood Canvas

I tried so many ways
to give you away
so I wouldn’t have to
destroy you; but
no one wanted you
even for free, and that’s
saying a lot about
where I live, where it’s
customary to adorn
curbsides with discards
but with care because
one person’s trash is—
well, y’all know how it is.

I was truly of the mind
someone would snatch you up.
Someone must need art
for their home. A placeholder
until something truly
snatches up their heart.
I mean, did passers-by not see
in you what I once saw?
A place of hope, a chance
to atone. But no, no one
saw even the Novelty
of your freeness. And so
I watched the rain wash you away.

Phallacy

Everyone knows it is customary, when you are new to a big small mountain town like Enormity, to promptly notify local men of the size of your cock, as a courtesy, so they can double down on their efforts to hold onto the local women. There are several ways you can promote your potential contributions to the community, effectively upsetting the way things are supposed to be: Visit the Sunday brunch café where mimosas are always on discount and patrons are always amenable even though the night before there was conflict at the dive bar. (Discounted mimosas are for more than soothing hangovers; they are for mending fences.) If your cock is truly something, then you will take the opportunity to offer your services to the café. You already have a reputation around town for being the Don Juan of lime wedges and hot sauce. They are already talking about the children you will sire, a beautiful brown-eyed girl & a boy, who will never truly know you but that’s how the story goes in big small mountain towns like Enormity. If you’re not from here then you’re not from here but we will gladly take from you and then accuse you of stealing. Now: If you are not a man and are alone and new to the town, you need the biggest cock of all. This is all true,
I swear!

April’s books include Carousel (Inanna Publications), Winner of the International Book Awards for LGBTQ Fiction; The Poor Children, Winner of the Santa Fe Writer’s Project Program for Fiction; and Death Is a Side-Effect (Frog Hollow Press). Her fourth book, People Are Metaphors and Goodbyes, is forthcoming this December with Cactus Press Poetry, and her fifth book, big Small mountain town, is forthcoming in 2025. She’s a Pushcart Prize recipient for her short story
“Project Fumarase.” www.aprilfordauthor.ca