Tesco # 66

McGriddles

The sausage, egg, and cheese McGriddles kill,
they're deadlier than anything else on
the menu. They're best when hot off the grill.
I eat them swiftly, in two bites they're gone.

The taste of syrup injected pancakes,
of the sweet and fatty sausage, the egg,
the cheddar cheese sharp, I dip them in lakes
of pancake syrup, eat until I beg

for more, and more is what I get: it's hard
not to order more than one of these guys,
I pay for them in cash or swipe my card,
ordering up until my bank denies

the transaction: out of funds I eat air
as other people watch and gawk and stare.


The New Job

I'm not working a regular job right
now, so I've decided to make writing
my vocation, and which to my delight
allows me to make my own hours, sing

aloud while on the job, eat when I want,
take a piss when I need to, and call it
a day whenever I feel like it, flaunt
my millions of writing dollars, and sit

on the king crapper when I am working.
I turn up the music until I blast
my ears, I watch videos for jerking
off and see for myself how long I last.

This isn't the most remunerative
job, but I'm giving it all I can give.


The Story of the McNuggets

The McDoubles were dancing on the table to
the beat of Ariana Grande's "Love me Harder"
while the McChickens were plucking feathers

from the backs of actual chickens. The ketchup
made a noise that resembled a fart as I plopped
the contents of the ketchup bottle onto my plate

of fries and dipped the fries one at a time into
the puddle of sweet red ketchup. I asked the
cashier for extra sweet and sour packets for my

chicken McNuggets: I asked for four packages
of sweet and sour but the cashier said that only
the first two packets are free and that anything

more than that would cost me twenty-five cents
per extra packet. I declined and decided that my
McNuggets would simply go without the sweet

and sour sauce. My Diet Coke smiled as she saw
that I had given up on getting as many packets of
sweet and sour as I wanted because of the cost.

I became angry with my Diet Coke for gloating
over my defeat at the hands of the McDonald's
cashier, so I crushed her, spilling her all over.


I Couldn't Quit Smoking

I tried to quit smoking again today,
but it didn't last for more than a few
hours, the strong cravings got in the way:
it's harder to quit cigarettes than brew.

After my last package of cigarettes
I said to myself that this would be it,
I'd leave smoking behind without regrets
and pull through to quitting with all my grit.

I think about how I can take a sip
of Johnnie Walker and not get hooked hard
the way toking a cigarette can rip
my quitting goals to shreds, leave my lungs charred.

I have no idea how people quit,
they take the pills or patch and then that's it.


A Lack of Inspiration

I think that I've run out of things to write
about, I've written about sandwiches
and places to eat that bring be delight,
about smoking, and shitting my britches.

I'm having a lack of inspiration
there's things to write but nothings coming out,
this is like a form of constipation
when you are all out of things to write about.

The world is full of fun places to go,
and things  to see, and food to eat, and things
to write about, and new people to know,
and bogus places to spend your shillings.

If you have nothing to write about you
should walk about town along with your crew.

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Tesco # 66 by Cassandra Stein Castillo 

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"Five Poems" by Kenneth Larot Yamat