Self-Portrait as ‘Homecoming’
by Charley Eatchel
- The Death of St. Jimmy
Rattling like dead cornstalks
in wind-sharp December, our bodies
as close as lovers, St. Jimmy
offers me his last joint. We’ve been dancing
around this fever for months; now, we are wet
with rain and a desperate apathy.
Our dry, wanting mouths worked to lather.
In the mist, Jimmy’s edges’ blur,
and I can’t tell which burn I’m craving—
my lungs’ or his eyes’, both feel violent.
The flame won’t catch. The spark
eaten by night over and over,
and finally, he flicks so hard, the lighter
shatters in his hands. Plastic and metal puncture,
the air stinks of gasoline. Jimmy
looks up at me, face like a car crash,
bloody-eyed and wolf-toothed.
He lifts two fingers to his head, mock-pistol
at his temple, and smiles.
This life-like dream ain’t for me,
he pulls the trigger. Spatter
and viscera warm my soaked body.
The joint lights.
I breathe it in.
- East 12th St.
On our smoke break, Jesus shows me his scars.
Puckered knots at the center of his palms, the unhealed
gash at his side—he dares me to stick a finger in it,
but that seems like some kind of HR violation.
Your turn, he says, and I want to play it safe;
I flash the half-cresent under my chin—
a childhood lesson of flesh and linoleum,
the tear beneath my knuckle from working in the warehouse,
the slip of scissors that carved a circle beneath the meat
of my thumb. He catches my wrist,
enough with accidents, time for a real fix.
He ashes the cigarette, pressing
the butt to the hollow of my forearm. It digs in,
nestles its way beneath my skin, makes our breath
heat with blood and burn. My own insides
coating the back of throat, tongue-heavy. I close my eyes
in utter relief. I exhale, look up, and all that’s left of him
is a cross of copper and ash.
- Nobody Likes You
My coworkers laugh at the other end of the table.
They poet to each other, hollering and snapping, and I
watch a decade-old episode of Bar Rescue on my phone.
Everyone in this place is a performer, a writer, an artist.
Everyone in this place is friends with everyone else.
And I can’t get the bartender to give me a cup of coffee
without him spitting in it for good measure.
Do you want to hear a song? I ask him.
You need a drink, he replies.
I try to tell him, I don’t do that anymore—
but he slides a glass in front of me.
Crimson and sexy, rim dusted in sparkling silver.
Crushed razor blades, he tells me, but the garnish is your favorite.
He pops open a safety pin, glides it over the crest
of this thumb, pushes it into the tense flesh
of a sour cherry. The needle catches skin,
struggles to break it. Stretches and pulls. Snaps.
My mouth is watering when the point
bursts through, thin gash bleeding all over his hands.
Oops, he lets the fruit fall into the drink and the open pin
follows. Enjoy, he says.
- Rock and Roll Girlfriend
Everyone in the stranger’s basement is on something.
My roommate is passing out acid tabs, and a group
of finance bros do ketamine in the corner.
Rock and Roll Girlfriend thinks the party is boring.
She thinks my friends are boring, and that maybe I
am boring. But there are no clubs nearby and
neither of us has a car, so she asks me to hold her
hair back as she does a line off the bathroom sink.
When it’s my turn, she runs her acrylics along
the back of my neck—the slice feels better
than the high. She carves a heart
in the nape’s soft skin, kisses the wound
and licks her lips. I pull her into me,
all sharp hip bones on hip bones,
clawed nails in shoulder blades, studs
on leather, digging, picking, cutting.
Even her teeth—filed like fangs,
when we kiss, she bites so hard my lip splits.
Rock and Roll Girlfriend pulls me apart.
The blood starts spilling from everywhere.
As it pours from my eyes, she wipes it away
with her thumb, and, ruined-mouthed, I grin.
- We’re Coming Home Again
We’re back on my porch, summer-lit
in Edison bulbs and fireflies.
We haven’t seen each other since
we got clean—Jesus, Rock and Roll Girlfriend,
and I, sober now and sadder, scars
faded to white and tears dried up.
You never got all the blood out,
Rock and Roll Girlfriend says,
toeing the stained steps with her boot.
St. Jimmy sank into the wood and never left.
I tried to wash him out, but the rust splatter
made me too hungry for what he had.
My fingers brush the dark spots, remembering
that first taste. Jesus grips my shoulder
—all shaky and nicotine-patched. I grab
his hand, take Rock and Roll Girlfriend’s
with my other. Our bodies,
pressed together like lovers.