three poems

by Thomas Zimmerman

absinthe carpet

so Rimbaud’s bellowing the country band

that’s backing him lays down an absinthe carpet

sound   that is to say i’m listening 

to Dylan   //   grad school memories rise bright

& glistening evaporate they could 

be blessèd souls ascending heaven   really 

they’re just bubbles in my beer & i

remember one guy so damned smart his only 

answer in the seminars was laughter

//   i’m a middling muddler  beancount angel

scolds you idiot stop writing poems

i have my moments though   imagining 

ambivalent horizons    painted drywall 

i with wit & luck could kick clean through

the demon dynamo

my parents built a teenage bedroom for me 

in the basement of the house i slept 

& lifted weights played hard & punk rock music

loud   //   the roof of Hell my parents walked

& bore of course dark shadows of their own

but i believe i was the über shadow

of the house the demon dynamo

//   my homie angel tells me that’s poetic

puffery & has me sipping tea

instead of swilling beer a Zim who’s into 

Zen but i cling hard to western shit 

i so revere   //   the sixties baseball cards

the eighties zines with poems of mine no one 

should read these burn like kindling in my mind

dewed sagas

nun poop deified

rotator madam solos

civic stats redder

Photo of Thomas Zimmerman

BIO: Thomas Zimmerman (he/him/his) teaches English, directs the Writing Center, and edits The Big Windows Review https://thebigwindowsreview.com/ at Washtenaw Community College, in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA. His poems have appeared recently in Feed the Holy, Pulsebeat Poetry Journal, and Soul Poetry. His latest poetry book is My Night to Cook (Cyberwit, 2024).