Alan Catlin has several new books in the works including a long series of noir movie poems concluding with three chapbooks in one book under the title Exterminating Angels from Kelsay for mid-year 2022. he also has two chapbooks coming soon as well: Satan’s Kiss from Gutter Snob ad Dream Rider from Orchard Street Press.

Kamikaze

They must have
started out somewhere
in another country
and hit every bar
between wherever there
was and here.
They ended up against
the bar around midnight
looking for kamikaze
shots. "Give me
one good reason to 
serve you guys." I sd.
"We want to fly out
here straight into
the sun whenever it
comes up."
I made them shots.

Witches Tit

Maybe she thought there
might be an impromptu
Elvira lookalike contest
wherever she went dressed
for the occasion.  It must
have taken her half an hour
to cake all that make up
on her face and highlight
those deep blue eyes with
so much black shadow
that it made her seem
as if she were auditioning
for the role of a cadaver
in an Absurdist Play in case
the Elvira thing didn't
pan out. Listening to her
prattle on mindlessly to
a punked out, brain dead,
co bad actor dressed in
the best of the off the rack
duds the City Mission had
to offer, convinced me she’d
been programmed to turn into
a pumpkin or self-destruct
by last call, it was a toss up
which. 

Mind Eraser

What was left of
his mind was suspended
in an emulsion of
extra hot Buffalo style
chicken wing sauce,
curdled bleu cheese
dressing and a pitcher
of lukewarm tap beer.
His eyes were like
pickled eggs sliced 
in half, staring at
himself in the back bar
mirror.  What he saw
looking back at him 
through the cracks 
and flaking glass was 
horrible, the stuff dreams 
are made of.

Velvet Hammer

She holds him
weightless in the
palm of her hand,
looks deeply inside
his eyes and swears
eternal love.
Nights she doesn't
come home, he thinks
she is the high roller
in the Ladies Thursday
Night League.  When 
He finds out the hard
ball she was rolling
had nothing to do with
lanes or pins, he feels
totally left out in
the cold, on a Russian
steppe stunned to the
bones by a velvet 
hammer.