This poem is inspired by the punk rock band, the Germs.
Darby's Dilemma
Italics by Darby Crash and Pat Smear
What we do is secret
in the bedrooms, bars, brothels
that pulsate and fester like infected wounds
oozing through crumbling cities.
What we do is secret,
the notes and peer-reviews scribbled in margins
of a Sunday school bible.
“Some of your images are rather nice, Jehovah,
but your narrative suggests dementia of a higher order.”
What we do is secret
in beer-halls and salons,
with whispers of sedition.
Talk of treason in tea-houses,
tallying estimates for the orphans we’ll make.
What we do is secret
in the comfort of our homes,
but secrets too loud to keep
smolder like cigarette butts
on the armchair of a drunken, slumbering father.
