Shane Allison was bit by the writing bug at the age of fourteen. He spent a majority of his high school life shying away in the library behind desk cubicles writing bad love poems about boys he had crushes on. He has since gone on to publish four chapbooks of poetry Black Fag, Ceiling of Mirrors, Cock and Balls, I Want to Fuck a Redneck, Remembered Men and Live Nude Guys,  as well as four  full-length poetry collections, I Remember (Future Tense Books), Slut Machine (Rebel Satori Press), Sweet Sweat ( Hysterical Books), and most recently I Want to Eat Chinese Food Off Your Ass (Dumpster Fire Press). He has edited twenty-five anthologies of gay erotica, and has written two novels, You’re the One I Want and Harm Done (Simon and Schuster Publishing). 

Shane’s collage work has graced the pages of Shampoo, Unlikely Stories, Pnpplzine.com, Palavar Arts Magazine, the Southeast Review,  South Broadway Review, Postscript Magazine and a plethora of others. Allison is at work on a new novel and is always at work making a collage here and there. 

Bully

The last time I saw my cousin, Darrin
Was at the burial of my Aunt Lurine. 

It wasn't a sad funeral.
I didn't cry when they lowered her into Southside Earth.

Instead of wrapping me with a hug, he shook my hand 
As if I was simply a friend of the family.

Didn't show me the same kind of love as those
My kin folks give on my father's side. 

Maybe it had something to do with my being queer.
If so, I don't want to know. 

Growing up he was never much of a cousin.
Maybe because he was older than us and was never around. 

Too cool to spend time with a bunch of babies.
He was worse than any bully I ignored in school because he was family.

Teasing and picking until I had no choice but to fall into a fight
Which I always lost because Darrin was the oldest, the strongest.

He knew how tender the skin of a shy boy was.
My mother asked if I remember chasing him with a knife in my grandmother's backyard.

All that anger I would have cut him for sure.
I don't know why my aunt left him the most out of her money. 

He never wrote her letters or sent her poems. 
I imagine with all the trouble that has plagued our brood,

He will either see me at my funeral,
Or I'll see him at his.

Fat Boy

I'm barely awake checking emails
And social media messages
When my mother asks me 
If I want anything from the store. 
She does this sometimes
As if she's some kind of space Martian
From Mars who is new to planet earth
And doesn't know her way around a supermarket.
With sleep seeds in my eyes still,
I tell her to get yogurt,
Turkey cold cuts, and chicken pot pies.
I tell her to throw waffles in the cart,
Plums and green grapes without the seeds.
I know she'll forget most of what I ask 
For like kiwi and dragon fruit.
Raisin bread instead of Cherry plums.
I don't want to clutter corners of her mind
With things like blackberries and almond milk.
Needed ingredients for smoothies
To lower my blood pressure.
She will come home armed 
With an arsenal of bags 
Filled with turkey wings,
Ham hocks,
Neck bones and frozen okra.
Finger cookies for dad 
And canned vegetables pickled in some soupy,
Salty concoction.
She'll come with chocolate milk,
Sugar Pops and frosted flakes,
Zero sugar root beer for Dad's bad blood
And her kidney disease, which was
News she broke to me in the lobby at the Cancer center
Minutes before her cat scan. 
The calories I burn at Planet Fitness
Will only be regained under her reign
Where everything must be cooked 
With butter, bacon or grease. 
She doesn't know that it takes more than pushups
To flatten a belly like this.
A thousand thigh crunches to keep them from rubbing together.
My friend Chuck lost 90 pounds on Noom.
I would give both my nuts
To shed 90 pounds of fried food flesh,
Suck out the midnight cravings with a vacuum hose.
My mother doesn't know what it's like to look down
And not be able to see your dick without having
To hold your belly in. 
"You look fat sitting on the sofa," she told me once.
"Are you still going to the gym?" She asked when she
Saw me coming out of the bathroom with my shirt off. 
Tonight I'll write out a grocery list on the back of this poem:
Pork loin
Salmon
Beet and pomegranate juice
Almond milk,
Yogurt,
Blackberries and whiskey,
A little something extra for the smoothies.

Fast Food for the Birds

I couldn't finish the ham, egg and cheese sandwich
Cooked for breakfast this morning.
My blood pressure is sky rocketing,
Cholesterol thickening.
And I'm still trying to shake off this cough
That won't break.
Woke up Tuesday morning without taste and smell. 
Left the house with Prednisone,
Benzos and Amlodipine on my stomach.
I scour the streets until I settle
On a Whataburger in midtown, 
The one across the street from that new taco place.
I get a box filled with chicken tenders and
Shoestring French fries that are too salty for my heart
I barely eat anything picking over my lunch so
I feed my food to the crows, seagulls, and mottled ducks.
I leave the Texas toast. Carbs turn into sugar in the body.
A bird dips its beak in the cream gravy 
As if it's some kind of mating call. 
Let's hope I won't come out to find globs of seagull shit 
On my car. I just got it washed on Saturday