brett a. maddux is a poet from hartford & the creator of the instagram series @dinersofconnecticut. his first collection of poems, regent (Silk House Publishing,) was released in 2016. regent was written in diners, in conversations with friends about love & death & happiness & sadness & fear & joy & sex & religion & loneliness & attention & art, in the year after his mother died. here are five poems from his latest release blackbird, 4pm, a book of poems which can be purchased at whichiswhypress.com.
Written & Photographed by
brett a. maddux
​retail, 8am
new fear tuesday morning miracle calling in my bets on all the horses never placed & I am due a minor fortune to carry me back through the streets of my childhood babysitter crippled middle school librarian yellow hardcover first nipple I ever saw mormon grocers elegant nurses putting their fingers in my third grade asshole a man once said I'd never amount to anything more than my mother grinding her teeth away every night hospital visitations miniature smiles & if I ever make it out of this town alive long odds two bits on the smallest colt | ​ if not all the way at least half
what comes next is anticlimax the god of meager losses the last photograph remaining of eyes early morning breakfast cigarette lips in winter hair still messy from sex under blankets bloody knee concrete congregation if it ain't holy at least it's painful & they don't say it that way now do they they don't pray for arthritic housemaids low wage department store cash register clerks taking the piss out of mega church pastor porcelain coupons housewives can I talk to your manager her heart still beating beneath her apron | hi my name is cindy can I help you yes mother I still love you
what comes next is revelation journey without destination wrist brace back ache medication some paul harvey recitation on your childhood radio station every song sounds like salvation that is her laughter in the cobwebs that is her singing in the attic those are her teeth turned into dust that is her love that calls the cat in |
lungs, 11am
​so much harder to look it in the eye when it is smiling back patting good old boys bellies bleeding battery acid to take the bark off trees so much harder to say sorry if you never really mean it online shopping sibling coffins a good deal if you can get it free shipping lungs filling I hear misery don't come cheap
so much sweeter to drink my sister's blood when she dies young & preventably honey keep the noise down daddy is watching his shows in this one all my devils dress business casual shake hands with wise men & naked angels in this one mother draws a bath & I wash her hair while she opens her veins in lukewarm water | in this one I tell you my name but you do not hear it in this one I have coins enough to pay off those barking dogs bounty what my soul is worth bound to drain her bathwater drown me if I get too close |