Three Poems by Heath Brougher

Grunge Poem Get Well Card

Sleep precious my pretty pneumonia;
my rag-doll of bloodstream; you can
cough on me anytime you want
ever since I heard the life-rattle of the flu
in your bronchi;          the hospital
is spilling out with       patients like over-poured milk;

may your ribs not be razed by your incessant coughing;
may dusk work its way into this epidemic;
may the medical community invent a flu shot
that is strong enough to overpower this current string;
but most importantly, my pretty little pneumonia,
may you please wake up from your current state,
stretch your arms out wide, sigh a morning sigh,
and begin to feel like rain, that is, right as.



Burning Leaves

Something else after the fact rolled down
the sleeve unlike a raindrop or ball; more square
and untrustable than misshapen lies . . . this weaving path
leads nowhere, you may as well just let go now . . .
pig's vomit at the rainbow's end, the slaughtered leprechaun
(they're evil anyway), so we euthanize
their poor green goldless suits so flammable; feed them
dopamine and set them ablaze with flambeaus;
voids and vacuums and empty spaces are primary
to us today; the here and now is discombobulated
and confuses the senses, the sinus reaches through dense blockages,
for clarity, anything goes and nothing is right and relieved
and unveiled, the insane things . . . the sodas we shake and throw
into the air to explode and take off like rockets into power-lines
leaving them dripping sticky as we walk back inside
across the gluey ground
beneath our shoes.  Anything; anything at all to turn off this tedium,
anything so I don't just nod off . . . nod off . . . nod off . . .
nod off and gone forever.



A Nightmare in Purple

Down hollowest hill
a path twisted; born in the palm
of frigid gale, she wore a dress
that flowed through the fingers;
hard and high in the violets,
her face was a snapped-out-of-a-dream;
petite legs walking to the threshold
of a frightened wake.

Heath Brougher lives in York, PA and attended Temple University.  He has been writing his entire life but didn't begin to submit his work for publication until March of 2014, so he feels like he's got a lot of catching up to do.  He recently finished his first chapbook and has two more on the way as well as a full-length book of poetry.  His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Diverse Voices Quarterly, Mobius, MiPOesias, BlazeVOX, *Star 82 Review, Otoliths, Of/With, experiential-experimental-literature, Van Gogh's Ear, 521 Magazine, Stray Branch, Carnival, Indigo Rising, Inscape Literary Journal of Washburn University, and elsewhere.