MICHAEL INTERNICOLA

good advice

bob said, "i can't believe you only read half
my short story."-i told him get used to it.
he also told me not to leave it around. didn't
want anyone to steal the title. miami somethin'
somethin' he called it. he did a treatment for a
pilot but didn't even write the first show. said
he had three meetings with hbo and everything.
he had an idea about a bellman in a new york
hotel. actors trying to make it. at least five words
on the front page i never saw before in my life.
couldn't understand the meaning. he works the
door at a joint i hang out at three times a week. my
roommates behind the bar so i got it covered. i
never pay a cent. last night when i was leaving
with the fat girls he asked me, "so what you think,
mike?"-i stopped, lit up a cigarette and stood there
tapping him on the shoulder, "write what you know,
bobby."-i said, "and don't ever fucking write what
you don't."


19th poem

 i wrote 19 poems in the last fourteen hours. i got to look for a second job
tomorrow because the other one isn't paying enough. by the time i get there
and wait in line behind 700 other bartenders some of the famous movie stars
from the golden globes might still be up. i would.

"what are you wearing...?"-they'd ask me, "are you shy in real life?"

"fuck off."-i'd say. make myself play it cool.

then i'd drive down to the ocean and wait for sunset with rene or jennifer
who reminds me of my mother. all the while thinking it's damn nice not
having to sling drinks for the assholes tonight.


Warren Hayes

 i want to write
like warren hayes
plays his guitar.

it's enough to
make the three
used rubbers on
the floor have feelings,
enough to make those
twenty butts in the
ashtray get up and dance.


A novelist, M.A. Internicola is the author of three previous novels, KISS ME
BABY, SUNFLOWERS!, CHAZ, and ALL OUR SKIES ARE BLUE. The poems included here
are from two separate poetry books, MALISM and THE DARKEST PLACE IS UNDER A
STREETLIGHT, both completed early 2004. His poems/short stories have
appeared in Caffeine Magazine, Zygote In My Coffee, Remark, The Quadrangle,
Mule, Spent Meat, The-Hold, Antipatico, Lunitic Chamelon, Kant Magazine,
Fragment Magazine, James River Poetry Review and The Mosquito Lounge Review.
He lives in New York City.







© 2004 Underground Voices