Mark Cunningham

Telly Savalas or Isaac Hayes I’m not, though men on both sides of my family tend to be bald by thirty. I’m not even to the comb-over stage. The next-to-last woman (four years ago) clenched and hissed when I had to use two fingers to reach in and find the shucked condom: her first time. I should take lessons from the masters: Allen Ginsberg cleaned up with a haircut that makes Larry of The Three Stooges look debonair. That was in the sixties, though, and Allen was gay. The last woman (two years ago; I was number 27) hooked her left foot around my right calf and I tried not to get thrown. I could try the shaved-head, sit-pecking-a-laptop-in-a-coffee-shop look, but I can’t even afford a Hustler, let alone a laptop. America, I have $6.73, and you can’t have a dime.

I have poems in recent issues of Alice Blue and Dusie, and chapbooks on the Mudlark site (2002) and the Right Hand Pointing site (2006). Tarpaulin Sky Press will be bringing out a book tentatively titled Body Language, which will be a sort of diptych containing two separate collections, one titled Body (on parts of the body) and one titled Primer (on numbers and letters).

"Fueled" by Jennifer Balkan

current - submissions - archives - contact us