A LITANY FOR JARRET KEENE
Shane Allison

Jarret, can I ask you a question?
Well more like a few questions.
Have you written any poems lately?
And if so, have you written any poems about pickles recently?
What about tighty-whities?
Do you have any poems about potted soil I could borrow?
Have you ever written poems about dry, cracked lips?
Jarret, do you have any poems about chewing gum
Or cranberry-colored carpet cutters?
Jarret, what about a poem about Lou Diamond Phillips?
Got any Lou Diamond Phillips poems or poems about Siamese cats?
Can you get me a moped for Christmas
With a poem about it taped to the exhaust pipe?
You got any Joyce DeWitt poems lying around?
Can I have a bite of your danish?
Could you write a poem about my taking a bite of your danish?
I could use a good platinum wig poem
And poems about nylon stockings and durags.
You got any poems like this anywhere in your possession?
Jarret, when you write that poem about the chiliburger
Can you copy a few copies for me?
Better yet, can I get some chili cheese fries
Wrapped in wide ruled notebook paper with a poem
About chili cheese fries written on it?
Remember that series of poems about Marilyn Manson
You said you were planning on writing?
Did you finish it? Can I have one? The poems about Marilyn Manson?
Jarret, do you have any poems about hermaphrodites
Or poems about charbroiled chicken?
Or how about that poem you wrote about
Charbroiled-chicken eating hermaphrodites?
Do you still have that one?
Remember that bad dream you told me about, Jarret?
Did you write a poem about it?
Have you written any sonnets lately or maybe a villanelle?
Can you write me a villanelle about pimple cream?
Would it be too much to ask, Jarret, 
If you could write me a poem about Timothy Busfield?
Got any poems about radioactive urine in Rice Krispies?
Or if you have a poem or two about pissing in cereal,
That would be so neat.
Jarret, can you do me a favor?
Can you possibly write a poem about this dead
Armadillo I saw in the road once?
I need a coconut poem.
I need a poem about pink elephants and pig feet
Pickled in pig feet juice, Jarret. 
Do you think you can write them?
I need a hockey puck poem, a monkey wrench poem
And a poem about wax fruit.
Jarret, do you know anyone who has written
Poems about Tammy Faye?
Do you think you can write a sonnet on Tammy Faye?
I need it by Thursday.
This poem you wrote about deep-fried chicken fingers
I’ve been hearing so much about, can you fax it to me?
I might put an anthology of poems together about kiwi milkshakes.
Do you have anything that fits this theme?
You know what I need, Jarret?
I need a Dana Plato poem.
I need some poems about anal beads and shrimp forks.
Jarret, can you write me a poem about dust mops?
Jarret, I want you to write seventy or so poems
About cum in shag carpet in a purple van. 
Think you can do that?
Can you write about my hemorrhoids?
Can you write something about that bad case of anal warts I had last year?
I need a poem about chopsticks and anti-lock brakes.
I need a Beau Bridges poem.
I need that, and a poem written about Anne Bancroft eating peach cobbler.
Think you can handle that?
If you can, tell me about it in a poem.