The Sticks

When I was in fourth grade
I went to a Lutheran school
in the sticks

I didn’t know it at the time but some city people
Don’t know places like this exist
But they do exist 
And those places is where I’m from

The school had one teacher
The school had one classroom
Connected to a church
I didn’t know it at the time
But the teacher was an alcoholic

He liked fantasy books
He didn’t teach much

All day on Friday’s
He read to us
Except for recess

He did different voices
For different characters in the books

We were mean to him for no reason
He let us run around and do whatever we wanted

I didn’t know it at the time 
but he was like no other teacher I would ever have again

I had one friend
He was this giant kid
 Bigger than the rest

 I didn’t know it at the time
But he had Asperger’s

We ate pizza

Drank pop

Played Legos

Watched violent movies

Played violent videogames

His mom died suddenly
For no reason

She was super nice
She bought me clothes and food
She gave my parents a car
The school closed that year

The teacher died of alcoholism

I can still remember the different characters from the books 
and their voices

in college I had a 400-level medieval literature class with my childhood friend’s younger sister
we sat next to each other by coincidence
we found out we knew each other halfway through the semester
We learned about The Green Knight and The Faerie Queen

she was mean to me
for no reason
she didn’t care about how I use to be best friends
with her brother

nobody reads to me anymore
now I read to myself
now I have my own voices
for my own characters

the world is a lurking deceitful coward
the world wants me to be the same way
for no reason
but I won’t
and neither will you
never forget how
the world is terrified

Oil City Prison

I’ve never had a dishwasher.
My therapy is washing dishes by hand
You can’t stop me

I once had an apartment
With a dishwasher
I tried to use it once
But the dishwasher needed special soap

I kept washing by hand
No matter what
People made comments about how good I was 
At washing dishes.
I consider it an art form
I consider it a portal to a meditative state
I consider it a magic trick
From the heavens

My first job out of college was working
For a private contractor in a prison kitchen
It was so bad there was national news reports about it
A documentary about it
It was so bad
John Oliver did an episode about it
People died about it

The inmate who taught me how to operate the giant industrial kitchen 
was in prison for kidnapping the member of a jury

I met a serial killer
He killed girls in Ypsilanti
He acted too normal
He told me he was in for fraud

I met this inmate named Nua
He was the head chef
he made sure nobody fucked with me
He immigrated from Cambodia 
To San Diego when he was very young
Him and his brother were in a gang
Some guys tried to kill him and his brother
His brother got shot up but lived
When the guys found out they didn’t kill Nau and his brother they fled
Nau found out they were hiding out in a hotel room in Grand Rapids, Michigan
Nau drove to Grand Rapids
Nau killed them both with a knife
Nau studied law and worked his case and somehow got his murder charges down to second degree and was assigned a release date

I met this dude named Haas
He was in for being addicted to heroin
I helped him get a job at a pizzeria when he got out
He reminded me of my own friends

I met this kid named Gauss
He was in prison for safe cracking
A few of his fingers got blown off by a shotgun during a robbery
He was a decedent of Carl Fredrich Gauss 
Who was a mathematician
Gauss was one of the most brilliant people I’ve ever met.
He used headphone wires and a matchbox 
to build a universal TV remote to use in the TV room 
nobody taught him how to do this.

Inmates had sex with my coworkers in a backroom 
The backroom had a makeshift bed
Made out of a pallet and blankets
Not my business

in the corner of the huge kitchen
I found him
The best dishwasher in the world
Better than me
Operating a 30-year-old Hobart dishwasher
Rumbling and spraying loose steam water

The best dishwasher in the world
Is from Oil City, Michigan
You should look up Oil City after reading this poem
Everyone in prison calls him Oil City
Oil City is short, fat and has a speech impediment

Oil City was in prison for breaking and entering and false imprisonment
Which is sorta like a lesser form of kidnapping
Oil City broke into a women’s home, tied her up and ate food out of her refrigerator
Oil City specifically ate a steak sandwich
Oil City did not do her dishes

Oil City had Oil City tattooed in cursive on his hands
One hand said Oil 
the other hand said City

The prison feeds nearly 2,500 guys 3 times a day
Oil City did all the dishes
But it didn’t matter how many dishes Oil City did
He could never wash off the tattoos of where he was from
Oil City told me he started doing drugs when he was five years old
He wasn’t smart and other inmates took advantage of him and made him steal food out of the chow hall.
Not my business
Oil City got drunk off spud juice
Not my business

Oil City knew how to fix the dishwasher with rubber bands
and paper plates
Oil City hid stolen pieces of cake in the paper towel dispenser
Every night after dinner a small crowd of inmates and the chow hall officers and kitchen workers watched Oil City do dishes
Oil City wasn’t living in a prison in Saint Louis, Michigan
when he washed dishes

Now I wash my little sink of hot soapy dishes every night as a prayer
To the dishwashing god
I think he’s still in prison.
I think Oil City is going to be in prison for a long time
I think when Oil City gets out, he’ll be
going right back in again