I loves to sings in showers, recliners,
showboats, weddings, coat rooms,
meetings, workshops, bars, parking lots,
observation decks, and restrooms.
In a big, high office swivel chair
with my head thrown back
I sits and thinks at the ceiling.
I draws up words that are hidden deep
in the pit of my stomach.
It is a pit of tar where sabre‑toothed tigers play and swim.
Later in the day
I picks up a roll of masking tape
with words written on it in felt‑tipped pen.
I eats the masking tape.
Lower and lower,
the words tapes themselves in my trunk.
Then, like a bulletin board,
the important words tapes themselves
higher and higher
until they reaches my gut.
The gut disembarks from my body
like a wheelbarrow crashing down a mountain.
The wheelbarrow runs through trees and bushes losing possessions
finally laying down to die on its belly with the wheel spinning
pointed toward the sky
The wheel spins below the shelter of the sky.
Ben Beyerlein
is a writer and artist living in Glen Ellyn,