(っ◔◡◔)っ ♥ Sadboi Mode Activated ♥

Michael Washington

Time for me to do what I do best:

relapse on drugs and alcohol,

reinstall Muse Simulator VIII,

click “Create New Character,”

and write the worst poem ever.

I don’t know how to make stuff

without him here to inspire me,

so I go ask ChatGPT,

“What’s another way of saying

‘I can’t think of another way of saying

“I don’t know how to make stuff

without him here to inspire me”’?”

but my phone (literally) blows up,

destroying every last neverlasting piece

of evidence that he ever even existed,

which makes this a whole lot harder

because now I’m too drunk and high

to remember what he looked like.

When I try to picture him,

all I see is “Error: User Not Found.”

It takes me a thousand hours

just to get the left half of his cupid’s bow right,

during which time l gobble up so many of these

baby blue black market downers

that my blood starts to dream about me

falling from my fourth floor window

onto a welcome mat made of metal spikes,

releasing it (my blood) back into the wild,

where it can breathe clean air again.

I’m almost finished, though.

Three freckles, two freckles, one freckle to go,

then there he is, as sexy as ever

and backlit by god rays,

coming to life at twelve frames per second

like a stop-motion Galatea.

And am I crazy, or is that his voice I hear?

Considering what he said last time,

I turn the speakers all the way down

and the brightness all the way up

while pulling the monitor closer

and closer (and closer)

to the lips I haven’t stopped OCDly peeling off

ever since that day he left me for her.

Outside, the stars are pixels,

and the night sky is a screensaver,

and the buildings are computer towers,

and each person is a virus.

 
 

Michael Washington is a writer and illustrator. His work has appeared in a variety of publications, including Expat Press, Maudlin House, Spectra Poets, and The Drunken Canal. He lives in Spokane, WA.

@yunghegelian