To gooeysweet neighbors who can’t decide
whether to keep the damn fence or not
to coworkers stale as this parking lot
of a town, with threadbare dreams baked & dried
to Richie Rich compadres who’ll glide
through life on Mommy-Daddy’s nectar pot
to a daddy drunk on gall who only taught
me to be my own father on the side
to the gym-goons who spit right on the floor
to the chuffs who called me fat in study hall
to the baying yelping cur that lives next door
to a world that makes me want to end it all—
God bless! for showing me a better way
My revenge? not to be like you today
Kevin Blankinship is a professor of Arabic at Brigham Young University. His essays and poetry have appeared in The Atlantic, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Times Literary Supplement, Gingerbread House, Blue Unicorn, Wine Cellar Press, and more. Follow him on Twitter @AmericanMaghreb.