2 Poems by Jeff Grimshaw

Lease Breaking Party
Featuring Two One-Line TCM Movie Descriptions 

We need to keep this party going
She whispered and sent out the word
To every cemetery & lunatic asylum
Between here & the Arctic Circle
That we had cold beer & free brains
Or vice versa & I said shhh, the walls
Have ears & she said ffffff, I like ears
Well, what if a simple schoolteacher
Gets caught up in a wealthy baron’s
Crooked schemes? I asked Well she
Replied I have an aerosol spray for that
& cranked up the music, attracting
Gila monsters & hula girls, Medici
Popes & Alligator people, the landlord
Called to admit defeat, you win, you
Win, I concede! I laughed & cracked
Open a beer, just in time to see
6 cartoon figures vomit repeatedly.

Traffic Accident

A sneaker thrown 30 feet away
The contents of his paper bag fanned
All the way across the street and
Even into the open door
Of the barber shop. I remember
To breathe slowly and evenly, to
Force my lungs to fill and empty, to
Remind myself not to feel guilty
For thinking O god I am so glad
It is not her . I pick up an orange
And walk away, it’s nothing
To him now and I am hungry.
*

Bionote 

Jeff Grimshaw has had poems and stories published (among other places) in New York Quarterly, Asimov’s SF, and Chiron Review. He’s the co-writer of the screenplay for Michel Gondry’s movie The We & the I (2013). He generally makes his living as a baker, and lives in Milford, NJ.