Gutter Saints
The Work Beyond the Worker. A Guerrilla Literature poem by Kerr Martin, 6/2/26.
There are ghosts inside me
Of literary greats.
Poetic and prophetic,
They assure me of my fate.
They teach me to be angry
And they teach me to be wise
They teach me of the bitter bite
That ends all mortal lives.
Arghezi stalks the gutters
Burns lives in my roots
Bukowski smokes his cigarette
And spits at men in suits.
Strummer plays the soundtrack
And demands you know the words
They are dead and so is punk
But I’ll make sure they’re heard.
So let me break the boundaries,
Let me slay sacred cows.
Not to prove those bastards wrong,
But prove that I know how.
If I should earn a place beside them,
Let it not be with applause.
Let it be because I dared to kick
A hole clean through their walls.
The hawk still roosts above me,
Its talons on the page.
The ghosts still haunt my body,
Their hunger still sustains.
They did not teach me reverence.
They taught me how to bleed.
How to tear the world to pieces
Until the work’s all that remains.
Interested in more Kerr Martin poetry following similar themes? Check out yesterday’s Doing Business and these other pieces linked below.
Covert shot at the hawk!
Don’t mind the resetting. When you’re on a roll, you’re on a roll.