3 Poems

By Tim Frank

A Day Off from Stacking Shelves

Shooting rats
with a spring action gun
from my toilet window.
I’m going to clean up
this town
let it bleed out like sewage
feel the waste between my toes
then return to work
like a Hollywood movie star.

X

I’m shedding followers
like crumpled dollar bills
in a Spearmint Rhino strip club.
Where’s the love?
It’s locked in the attic
with Zen Buddhist monks
singing death metal dirges,
guillotined at the knees.

Brave New World

There’s something wrong 
with me—
I’ve got bugs inside my eyes 
hot coals on my tongue.
I’m writhing 
in my body,
a sleepless tomb
I call home.

Tim Frank’s work has been published in Bending Genres, X-R-A-Y Literary Magazine, Maudlin House, The Forge Literary Magazine, The Metaworker and elsewhere. He has been nominated for Best Small Fictions. His debut chapbook is, An Advert Can Be Beautiful in the Right Shade of Death (C22 Press ’24) and his second chapbook of poetry is, Delusions To Live By (Alien Buddha Press, ’25)