SCOTT SCHWALENBERG
FACTORY OF EXPLAINING DYING
When I reach the house, the shadow
of the house is just the house. I can feel
my weight, hear the grateful
explosions. We are surrounded
by the murder weapon
like this is the murder weapon
fan club. The feudal moon
has so many scars
it looks human. Its fingers touch us like bullets,
hoping we are real and
that there’s a couch
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*** ** ***
MARASMUS MOON
it’s something you only see
in movies
this one light
canonizing us
on the bland land
you tell a joke
I’ve heard before
but differently
in case I’d be offended
all the dead making
a mess of things
leaves and shit
in our minds
we’re burning
words
at least I am
where was I going
she asks
after the lull
the little moon
in my head
paraglides
over the lit wastes
where the battle
is half the battle
you were talking
about cannibalism
I say
oh yeah
she says
cannibalism
cannibalism
tonight I’m thankful
for cannibalism
the cumbersome
shape of hope
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*** ** ***
from a manuscript entitled GENTLY USED
you intend to wait until January
to put down
your dog
and by dog
I’m mean
what was I thinking
I was thinking
too much
we have a bank account with 5 bucks
but you can make serious life changes
for $0
in our minds
we’re running at each other
with our arms out
for different reasons
you say its too quiet
without music
but turn off the radio
we make what we’ll die of
if we’re lucky
luck has nothing to do with it
like a storm
an hour meant for us
blankets the rankness
you’ll ask
what time is it
and I’ll say
it’s time
to tell the truth
you are ruining my life
which now resembles
a mechanical bull
mounting another
mechanical bull
your disparaging parables
like impromptu plumage
rummage you
I don’t want the bird
you say
to the phone
the wayward mayhem
dawns
people are dissing us lately
and all I can manage
is a bird at the UPS driver
and another for the girl
who called you a bitch
we find ourselves lost
Nebraska is just another place
to lose
we sit like straightjacketed birds
staring at each other peripherally
pretending to watch the floating corpse
of a cloud
ours is a broken-down time
machine the mixed blessings
of which include a prorated apocalypse
i.e. we’re slowly getting fired
you’ve come to kill me
I say
as if to the sun
what
you say
nothing
I say
it isn’t realistic to think
this is love but we do it
on purpose
tell me again why
flamingos are pink
let’s be abandoned together
like essays about shit
littering the breeze
you keep saying
it’s not your place
the biting stalactites
unchosen by you
still
what the hell
is wrong with me
I almost bought a Wyoming sweatshirt
it’s a cursed place
a pain that’s yours
but you share
Nebraska
I’m sorry
you were never mine
it’s raining
under broken bat
wings
a half-life in here
preparing to prepare
living is arson
and you’re doing it wrong
blink the judgmental pentagrams
citing this pile of night
I’d rather not think
about the scribbling
starlings
don’t you think
dangerously close
you imagine the sounds of the car wash
outside the apartment
are the ocean
and say
Nebraska is killing me
the problem with Nebraska
is here is where
grief mummifies
it is disproportional to anti-grief
I scream at TV
when football does this
but what does one do when
so too does
watching memory dismember
a wheelchair inching
down the bleeping hall
out the window
there is just a small yard
filled with butts
I am told Nebraskans
are like horse turds
liable to be anywhere
but this only makes sense
in Wyoming
where there is
a cubic shit
ton of horses
what
I’m trying
to say is
the world is a particle collider
who are we
it’s fall
in hell
it’s Nebraska
it always looks this way
I say
another box with holes
we watch bats
get it on on the branch
we watch on TV
a baptism of schisms
touch me and see
we build a future
by giving up
the instructions
are in 12 pt Times New
Mandarin
winter is amorous
fuck it
you write
in a card
our sad maple’s dead
what chance
do you think
we have
a crowd screaming
means run
but what does it mean
when this happens
in my head
the birds are bailing
briefly we inhabit the sky too
promise insinuates itself on a runway
you’re also here
the land ends
we land in the sky
we were born
airborne
like rocks
we forget when
killer ponytail and fist bump
is a greeting
at the Denver
International Airport
your plan is to wait until January
to put down your cat
sometimes I pretend that my life
is an experimental film
I’m just watching
I died five times this week
all that’s promised is blood and fire and smoke
if you think about it
Debris or Blasphemy
are good girl names
we squint at each other like peepholes
this isn’t a religion
I’m going to work
I don’t want to work
where there are names
on my breaks
I scream over the ocean
bats like souls
in gloomy blooms
pour forth
clouds like teeth
strangely arranged
nom the dawn
they don’t give a shit
some days I’m a cloud
of bats crashing from
a throat clogged
they poke the dark
that props
the wobbly table
of my heart
a roomy cubicle
a cave paved
with unicorns
spelunking and fuddling
an enemy to forgive
is like a suggestion
to find yourself in the dark
are you still there
are you awake
hope to die organically
no
I mean like origami
I wish I could tell you
how many swans have I
unfolded to write this
it is always hard
and it is hard now
I still can’t see
what I’m writing
in the unforgivable light
all my life
I have been a fat man
jumping from a window
and landing on an old woman
and her dog
o death
where is thy consolation
widen also your phat heart
for our garden
touch it not
we fold like omelets
into our garden/grave
near us are
uprooted
some leis
how long before we settle
the cemetery
there were also
in my youth
tombs
when my eyelids open
I go to the cemetery
it’s grey
but it’s never too late
for a bloodbath
whatever
you have to tell yourself
in the future
a couch in the pool
a couch in the field
a couch slouching from a dumpster
on fire
but that’s the future
now the stars are noising
over our floating hunk
rise and kill
they say
remember
I remind you
night hides in night
I scare myself
asking
if it’d kill you
I love you
just not your thoughts
our work’s done
here
don’t not be afraid
night is an x-rayed ghost
no
how did it go
night is an x-rated ghost
are these hands enough
tonight
we say it’s dead
streetlight on your eyelashes
in the future
a fur coat
made of eyelashes
it’s how I’m caught
forced to learn a new alphabet
enter or return
where the gross ghosts
of hope
drink my blood
you cannot slake
the altar
you can’t
it is enough
stay your hand
I use my hand
to measure the light years
between us
in the night of leeching reaches
aborigine of my soul
on the humbled bluffs
on the naked plain
on the girthy earth
let’s take some hostages
it’s something people say
in Spanish
you say
I’m going to kill you
my only question is
why do I find frailty endearing
I live in a koan
waiting for the future
a time-lapse explosion
I know not any
how do we go on
we lie on our backs
like dying spiders
the day grows into itself
by shrinking
but once in a while
it is worthwhile
you can tell
the stars leave reviews
everywhere
oeuvre
who could see night as anything
but connubial
the sound of empty
entropy its overture
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SCOTT SCHWALENBERG
Scott Schwalenberg was an editor for HOUSEGUEST Magazine, an online literary journal. His first book, All There Is Is, was published by Octopus Books in March of 2026. He lives in Nebraska where he teaches English, runs the design studio Flybylight LLC, and makes art.
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