JORDAN HAMEL
In media res
Did you ever find me?
Stuffed prostrate in the National Park
soil, mouth full, earthworms in ears,
your skin composting under
my nails. My favourite antihero,
you said you’d come back for me
when the heat is off,
when the golden hour burns out,
when the lens starts to refocus.
Now I’m just dirty money holding
memories of misdeed, touch me
and risk everything. Launder me
through your legitimate endeavours
scrape off my serial numbers, for you
I’ll be untraceable, for you I’ll be passable.
The ground is sweet, rotten, memory foam;
quite frankly I’m exhausted.
There are no small parts and you’ve got to admit
I’ve got range. I’ve been a child, parent, nurse,
doctor, accountant, hitman, lawyer, old friend, new
enemy, innocent bystander who saw too much,
old flame refusing to leave, scowling in a
feather boa and opal negligee, just out of frame.
Maybe it was always my calling
to be an extra in my own story.
I still remember the shovel’s
thunk puncturing distant sirens,
your palms dripping onto my face,
closing my eyes one by one.
Ssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhh
this was always the plan.
I’m terrified of the credits,
never knowing if they’re
opening or closing.
The worst thing that will ever happen to you hasn’t happened yet
but it will soon just like someone’s dad always said
I assume even a broken man is right twice a day
and there isn’t a masculinity crisis I can fix
never learnt the tricks of the trade an adolescence
exploring my own nuts and bolts now I’m all kinds of
ill-equipped can’t tell the difference between a socket-wrench
and an orgasm a poor workman always blames his you know
but we try and do and make do
like that Facebook video dry instant noodles scuffed and varnished
for missing floorboards noodles to level wobbly bar stools
noodles shaved and spackled to mend a porcelain dream
the substitute teacher for sex education filing down
a block of noodles into the world’s driest buttplug
noodles for the batteries in my vibrator noodles
to unstick the pages of vintage magazines noodles
for borer holes in the casket noodles to confront decay
noodles to prove someone was ever there
noodles for all busted things except the body giving you nothing
but want and expiration giving you everything
to build your own demolition
I just want to back a trailer into a garage filled with power tools
I can confidently name for trades I could theoretically pursue
but I can’t and I can’t and I won’t
and the last old man I’ll ever disappoint is me
where I grew up men don’t get sick they rust
like grizzled house cats under the ute they crawl
with a quiet they’ve always carried they don’t die
just become another blunt saw you never throw away
Earl Sweatshirt said he’s ‘hotter than at least five heaters’
a conservative estimate especially by hip hop standards
Earl could’ve said ‘at least ten’ no one would question him
I’m like two maybe but they’re those little round Briscoes ones
that whisper ghosts of burnt hair and exploited labour
but Wellington’s cold in July soooooo whatareyagonnado?
I think Earl was referring to Mitsubishi Heat Pumps™
as seen on TV with former NZ cricket captain
Stephen Fleming of which Stephen is only three tops
Earl’s hotter than Stephen and
Stephen’s the face of the whole operation!
I’m falling in and out of love with my own mediocrity
society welcomes my outline
like a tax cut my overstuffed skin
tote bag lumps folds billowing
contracting like an out of tune flesh accordion
Seth Rogen was voted sexiest man alive we all
simultaneously exhaled I even had the audacity to trial
a wide-brimmed felt hat and overalls… overalls!
like some intergalactic pilgrim
sent to the new world to disappoint people
my laziness is sexy because its performative like
a game show where contestants see how long they can go
not calling their parents or a sequined recliner
in this world it helps to be kind and funny
I mean it helps to be kind of funny
most people would rather be hot than endearing
I want a jealous fan club I can neglect emotionally
I want strangers who meet me in passing at parties
to decide upon request that yes they would die
to save me from a minor inconvenience
wrapping themselves in tinfoil during a lightning storm
to charge my phone
engraving my internet usernames and passwords
onto their tombstones
flying me to an ancient Swedish commune
sewing themselves into a bear suit and self immolating
so i can finally become the Mayqueen
I wouldn’t die for me but I’ll buy
progressively looser sweaters stuff myself
into black ‘skinny jeans’ grow
my beard to hide a disappearing jawline
and someone will call me Jonah Hill-chic
or neo-masc farmcore or pre-dad bod
and put me in a fucking heatpump ad
and on the way home from the shoot
I’ll listen to Earl and we’ll both know the truth
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jordan Hamel (he/him) is a Pōneke-based poet and performer. He was the 2018 New Zealand Poetry Slam champion and represented Aotearoa at the World Poetry Slam Champs. He is the co-editor of Stasis Journal and co-editor of a forthcoming Climate Change Poetry Anthology from AUP. He has poems in Poetry NZ Yearbook, Landfall, The Spinoff, Mayhem, takahē, Sport, Mimicry and elsewhere.