writer – Kevin Trent Boswell

Please Hold

I just spent one hour
And five minutes on hold

It couldn’t be helped,
It was something that I had to do,
Or I’d have been in bad shape
For weeks to come

I sat and listened to that
Goddamned hold message
For an hour and five minutes

They repeated it
Every twenty seconds;
I counted

“We’re sorry, but all of our agents
“Are busy assisting other customers.
“Please hold and we’ll be with you
“As soon as possible.
“There are currently more than
“Three callers ahead of you.”

I put my phone
On the ‘speaker’ setting,
And laid it on my belly

I was smart and plugged it
Into the charger,
Figured I would
Kill a few birds with one piece
Of terminal boredom

I added another layer of
Multitasking to my
Very minor ordeal

I read Bukowski’s
Love is a Dog from Hell
While I waited

Forty minutes in…

It was frequently difficult
To concentrate, with that
Stupid message, every
Twenty seconds—“We’re just a
“Tiny bit sorry…
“All of our agents are
“Pretending to be busy, so we
“Can feel like we’re important,
“And squeeze a few more bucks out,
“By not paying any more staff than
“We absolutely have to.
“There are three callers ahead of you.”

But the breaks in my focus,
They gave me an excuse to jump back
Several lines and reread what I
Had just read, to make sure that I
Hadn’t missed anything

The boredom,
The stupid interruptions,
The longing for a life that is not
A prisoner of circumstance,
A slave to bureaucracies,
To be able to do something else…
Any fucking thing that is something
Other than this stupid shit…

“We’re sorry, but all of our agents
“Are playing solitaire and circle jerk.
“Please hold onto your sanity…
“Or don’t; we could all use a good laugh.
“There are currently
“Two callers ahead of you…
“We think. We could be wrong. [Shrugs.]
“Who the fuck knows, really?
“We’re not fucking philosophers.”

It went well with the poetry,
It matched Chuck’s experience
Of life

Always waiting
Waiting on life to just
Come off it, already

Forty-five minutes

“We’re sorry, but all of our agents
“Are placing bets on horses,
“Arguing with whores,
“Getting drunk and feeling lonely,
“Feeling happy, angry, nothing at all.
“Anything but assisting customers.
“Please hold and we’ll be
“Finished shitting as soon as possible.
“There is one caller ahead of you.”

Maybe that last part was Charles
Talking to me,

I forget

I do know that he said
(And I’m paraphrasing here,
Paraphrasing wildly… speculatively,
Because ol’ drunk Chuck said
That’s the only way to do anything)

He said that we’re all sitting here,
Knowing, knowing that life,
The real life, is available, out there,
If only the small-minded
Would get out of the way,
And let the rest of us have it

We’re not entitled to it,
We realize that;
No one is entitled to
Anything

But the rich, the powerful,
And the boorish, dreary,
Unimaginative oafs,
They seem to have
All the access
To all the best stuff

But they’re too greedy,
Too fearful, too lacking in vision
To step aside and let someone else
Have a crack at the good stuff;
They feel they never have enough,
Or that only they can
Handle it all properly

And so,

Wait

And

Wait

Some

But I got it done, ⠀
The thing⠀

And now, I can
Wait⠀
⠀
On something else

A Collage of Chimeras and Phantasms, by Kevin Trent Boswell, available on Amazon — Available on Amazon, 216 pages

This Should Do Well

This poem fits neatly
Inside an Instagram panel

It isn’t deep, although it
Feigns depth and wisdom

It says you’re not an ignorant,
Entitled, hateful little shit

It pretends that you are perfect
Just the way you are

This poem will likely
Be very popular

A Collage of Chimeras and Phantasms

by Kevin Trent Boswell available on Amazon

Now available on Amazon

Coming Soon

On Saturday, I spent the entire day editing and submitting the manuscript for my new book.

I got it finished and turned in, then treated myself by eating too much pizza.

The author’s proof should be here in a day or two and I can proofread it. Then, it will go live and be available on Amazon.

Back in the Day

Back in the old days,
If a lady thought she fancied you,
She’d drop her handkerchief;
You were looking, and she knew

This signaled to a gentleman
“Sir, do come and flirt with me”
In returning it, his charm
(Or lack thereof) she could see

Supposedly, now a quick smile
Does what the hanky used to
But modern men know better,
There is no acceptable thing to do

One woman says, “Here is good,
“But never, ever, over there!”
But the next one will say the opposite;
So, men guess in despair

If you approach because she smiled,
She’ll say, “I was just being polite”
But suddenly, she’s uncomfortable,
And she’ll say, “That’s not right!”

If you cannot read her mind,
Then your head is made of rock
And unless you’re rich and famous,
You’ll be slandered on TikTok

But if you don’t take the risk,
Then she’ll feel like you rejected her
She’ll tell her friends you’re a coward
When you thought you respected her

A woman thinks she’s flirting
If she blushes, smiles, and fidgets
But if you want him to make a move,
Drop a hanky or your digits

weekend

“time to pretend that we’re so cool
“as if we’d earned it, and we deserve more
“time to act like a selfish fool
“lose track of the count, settle the score”

you can have all that; you guys go ahead
it’s a hard no; I’m not into it, pass
shallow people make me wish I was dead
I’d rather eat a bowl of broken glass