Laugh Like a Hiss of Gas

Shit, Schmidt! Don't try and jince out of this one!
Your life is a mad dream in the drunken brain of a god!
But that won't relieve you of anything!
Take that bunch of blooms like a burst of music
beside a lonesome guitar
—you didn't contrive it: you recognized it
as a sudden symbol of song!
Divinity is in the details!
Like the way the crack in the Liberty Bell
makes a mental map of America
or that tobacco executives look like snuffed cigarettes
—it all makes fantastic terrible sense!
No grace is painless: a smile is the gnashing of teeth!
There are those who would eat the sun if they could!
With a blank blink! So let them swallow Obliterol
and laugh like a hiss of gas at life’s last gasp!
As vague and dazed as your days may be, the ache that slurs
within you flickers in eternity with a glorious dignity!
Take this ache! Waltz with it! Shit, Schmidt! You’re in this for life!


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