At Lunch in Rehab We Watch Bob Ross by Polley Poer

for the purity. Us grief-locked, drug-busted drunks
remembering how to paint with a finger and sponge.

We chew sour candy for the cravings. Too cold
to sit out and smoke. The sky threatens ice, and if we’re not careful
we’ll stay fucked up to keep each other’s company.

Onscreen, he blends outward a winter sky
(titanium, phthalo, midnight).

One girl says you know, he had a tough life, and she means
before PBS. Before his finger broke off. Before the war.

Before he saw the white hills of Anchorage for the first time and swore
to paint those lightless mountains until he died.
To never raise his soldiered voice again.

The gloom, I think, is something holy. Fixed. Clean.
Out of body. My sun lives with me, he says. The real
message: something rises still.

We are wet-on-wet, crooked
trees—pointless, hooked, and begging
to leave the war behind.

Our tongues are raw and flinching,
hoping for snow.

From: https://americanliteraryreview.com/2023/04/04/polley-poer/

Date: 2023

By: Polley Poer (19??- )

Tags: 2023, at lunch in rehab we watch bob ross, for the purity us grief-locked drug-busted drunks, poetry, polley poer