Frederick Frankenberg

Doing Heroin

Drive a car into the sky
Put the powder in the chamber
Push the trigger to pause a nightmare
See it all beyond the cosmic system
With a head full of circular wisdom
On the corner, cigarette burnt out
Climbing the step stool to heaven


Intimacy is Dangerous

The girl I sought
The girl I found

Her fake blonde hair
Her unremitting eyes
Her relentless smile
Her exhausted bra strap
Her scurvy bob
Her cancered kiss
Her loud piercing thoughts
Her feeling antennae
Her sharp lobster claws
A gold terror band!

I swim away on the quickest current

Frederick Frankenberg (he/him) lives in Highland, NY. His work has been published in KGB Bar Lit Review, Right Hand Pointing, CC&D Magazine, and Pulp Modern Flash. He is also published on an engineering professor’s office wall, next to her children’s drawings.