national bohemian, renegade poet laureate of baltimore city
who else can trace the cracks in every midtown dive
by nat raum
make me poet laureate of this fucking city already.
because who else has even attempted
to translate it so kindly despite how
much it’s dirt it’s thrown on me? who else’s ego
death is buried under the shot tower in a 40
of boh? i wanted out, you know, when a garden suburb
was all i knew and the air was stale
with old money—and that’s not to say that now
i don’t look more than respectfully at philly
or the south of france sometimes. i stayed;
i learned fifty-seven new kinds of drunk and hurt.
my guts now feel like raisins after half a beer.
who else can trace the cracks in every midtown dive
ceiling without looking? whose blood is one
with the concrete outside, but mine?
nat raum (b. 1996) is a disabled artist, writer, and genderless disaster based on unceded Piscataway and Susquehannock land in Baltimore. They’re the editor-in-chief of fifth wheel press and the author of this book will not save you, the abyss is staring back, random access memory, and others. Past and upcoming publishers of their writing include Gone Lawn, Split Lip Magazine, Allium, and BRUISER. Find them online at natraum.com.
