Gasoline Dream
by Derrick Carr
Don’t everybody like the smell of gasoline?
Well burn muthafucka, burn American dreams.
—Outkast
When they left that rotten boy to turn
sweet in the heat, did they ask
for gasoline? Making crackling
from skin is familiar work,
‘round here. Light him. Let him bleed
black & quench into the tarmac’s smooth
skin quicker
than he deserved, that dirty little—
—dirty little American dream
that died on this block, in that park,
in that gas station lot,
in this gated community
& in that other park, under
the snow-glazed gazebo
and how that forever ruined
sweet pink ink for an entire neighborhood
and maybe that’s the path to justice—
we point out that they’ve ruined snow cones.
/* & */
Often, I wonder what song to give
to a forest of boys felled in the street.
There’s a bass humming in me.
Grandma would holler Quit rattling
that noise before you wake up the dead.
It’s just a figure of speech,
I think.
Let’s try it anyway.
Well burn muthafucka, burn American dreams.
—Outkast
When they left that rotten boy to turn
sweet in the heat, did they ask
for gasoline? Making crackling
from skin is familiar work,
‘round here. Light him. Let him bleed
black & quench into the tarmac’s smooth
skin quicker
than he deserved, that dirty little—
—dirty little American dream
that died on this block, in that park,
in that gas station lot,
in this gated community
& in that other park, under
the snow-glazed gazebo
and how that forever ruined
sweet pink ink for an entire neighborhood
and maybe that’s the path to justice—
we point out that they’ve ruined snow cones.
/* & */
Often, I wonder what song to give
to a forest of boys felled in the street.
There’s a bass humming in me.
Grandma would holler Quit rattling
that noise before you wake up the dead.
It’s just a figure of speech,
I think.
Let’s try it anyway.
Derrick Carr has lived in the Bay Area since he was old enough to read. He graduated from Yale in 2011 with a degree in Black people. While there, he co-founded the school's slam team. Since then, he's co-edited Tandem, an annual anthology published through The Lit Slam, a Bay Area based nonprofit working to broaden the conversation around literature. His work is forthcoming in Oakland Review. You can keep up with him at tinyletter.com/whyderrick.