It’s not your imagination, Doug.
–KUT
We have no reason to trust the police or the cops or the courts.
-Mary Hooks
For each of the past four years, more Americans have died from drug overdoses than were killed in the wars in Vietnam and Iraq combined.
–Zachary Siegel
He made a dishonest case for war. Thirteen years before George W. Bush lied about weapons of mass destruction to justify his invasion and occupation of Iraq, his father made his own set of false claims to justify the aerial bombardment of that same country. The first Gulf War, as an investigation by journalist Joshua Holland concluded, was ‘sold on a mountain of war propaganda’.
–Mehdi Hasan
For the past nine years I’ve been struggling to put into words the anger and fear, the survivor’s guilt, and PTSD…I felt overwhelmed watching the news, it seemed like every month in 2015 there was something new and horrible…I started this poem.
–Devi S. Laskar
At a check-in for Yoga.
“How’s your Monday?!” Every note struck with each syllable ascends. She sounds like she’s on a kid’s show and anyway insane.
“Alright (MONOTONE).”
“That’s not bad!”
(HEAVY BREATHING, SILENCE)
“So you’d like to drop in then…?” She changes the subject. That’s better.
Asking someone how they are and debating the answer is two times more annoying than the exchange need be and anyway psychotic. I took the class. I felt better. My Monday was alright.
My buddy got charged $349 for health insurance this month. That’s a 17,350% increase from his usual premium of $2. When he called the insurance company he was put on hold for 50 minutes while he got ready for work. They’d have to transfer him to another department. He held there for about 10 minutes before they told him there was a problem with his 2017 tax credit. He’d have to fill out 2 forms, an 8962 and a 1095A, with the IRS. Once he did that he’d have to call them back.
“Ok,” he told them. “But you need to refund the $349 you took from my account without my permission.’
They said they couldn’t do that, told him he’d have to call the Marketplace and gave him the number. It was the same number he just called and waited for almost an hour on before they transferred him to them. He told them that $350 is a lot more than $2 and he never gave them permission to take that much money out of his account anyway and he needed to get to work after spending more than an hour on the phone with them. They said they still couldn’t refund his money so on the way to work he called his bank. He cancelled the payment but not before series’ (plural) of questions–the first set verifying him with the bank, the second with the dispute center. They asked for his social security number, then his email address.
“I just gave you my SS#”, he told them, “why do you need my email?”
“Ok, sir, we’ll just mail you the results of the dispute then.”
“No, I didn’t say you could do that either.”
My friend lives in a garage apartment, he’s been trying to get an address there since he moved in over a year ago. The landlord dragged his feet on it but finally took the initiative when he thought about individuating the utilities. But my friend still didn’t know what the address was even after repeatedly asking. The last time someone sent something to his address it was a credit card company and marked UNABLE TO DELIVER, sent back and the account was cancelled. P.O. Boxes aren’t valid addresses for credit card and health insurance companies. He gave them his email. He was on hold when he got to work and started pulling and loading the van with his phone in the crook of his neck. They’d have the issue resolved in 10 days. In the meantime, during Yoga last night, he felt strange rumblings and had to leave the class. He decided to go and see a GP. He figured he had 10 days left insured, at least until his bank cancelled the unauthorized payment.
He was part of the system, ya dig? Like you, like me and everybody. Like we should feel lucky to. Guess it could be worse but I am tired of living that way. You know, constantly telling yourself how good it is doesn’t sound good to me. The lady doth protest too much and all that shit. All I know is, it shouldn’t be so hard. Why do we need a tax break to pay monolithic and obsolete healthcare providers? And for Christ–why are we talking about war? Right, election season. I’m glad we’re talking about refugees but between keeping them out and letting them in won’t any candidate speak up for a living wage for the rest of us? They talk about War and the dark other. They fight with each other but never question if they should be paid a living wage and have government healthcare. And these aggressions, overseas and in the ravaged and calamitous middle East–you know who will settle these scores? Our boys, and girls or however they identify (way to go) and who will only come back scarred, insane and … as likely to kill themselves as they are to kill the enemy, whoever that is. S’ok, we’re living this through, again and again, watching this country stoop lower and lower as the sun comes closer and the air becomes increasingly rarified and tons of ice disappear off the caps.
Somebody should holler or expatriate and by somebody I mean me. I’ll be out on the road this summer, bet, and scrambling to keep my bank account up to 4 digits. I’ll keep you posted on the shows, books and readings and I’ll be doing battle with the beast at hand—that is the roaring black torpors of depression. What else?
See you at the show motherfucker.
I am thrilled to announce that Yellow Lark Press will be releasing No Comebacks this year. Over forty poetic meditations on the champions of American boxing—working class fighters, dancers and jabbers, griots, gamblers and grifters and warriors all. A wonderful collection from the brilliant poet Will Stenberg, No Comebacks is a human tapestry embroidered in blood and stitched with sweat. Step into the ring with No Comebacks this year, through Yellow Lark Press.
JIM TRAINER LIVE IN THE WRITER’S ROOM ATX
JIM TRAINER WRITING THE COARSE GRIND FOR INTO THE VOID MAGAZINE
JIM TRAINER’S POEM OF THE WEEK
CLICK 
Going for the Throat 