Stranger Musings
____by Logan Beitmen

she wore a t-shirt
of marylin manson which
read "kill your parents”

for she was free from
authorities beyond her
own weak invention

she looked up at me
didn't twitch her face into
any emotion

she stared at the surf
wondered who butchered mermaids
and left only kelp

but there she still was
she claimed it was her duty
to revive lost dreams

in the briny blue
she thought she saw something gleam
a fish mad with gills

what if she could be
that fish in the death-chop who
jumped like a freed slave
she sat on the sand
watching old men pass by with
metal detectors

she nearly cried there
seagulls pecking a raw fish
foam popping like dreams

a young couple swam
skinned alive by the sunshine
raspberry texture

she sits in the sand
decides to rebel against
this concept of hell

she will swallow the
earth's bullets and spit flowers
out her dead body

she will walk death's beach
for she is a survivor
who's ready to live