Bad Batch By Ryan Quinn Flanagan

17 junkies died last week

in the city

of an overdose,

a bad batch of heroin

which happens now

and again,

same thing happened

to Janis Joplin

and a number of others

over a single weekend

back in 1970 Los Angeles,

they were there and then

they were not,

needles hanging from their arms

like new skin.

I hate needles.

I’ve had to have allergy shots

most my life.

And booster shots and blood drawn

and a plethora of other

spikings.

I might snort heroin,

but I would never shoot it.

Plus there is a natural reluctance   

to put anything in your system

that has been smuggled up

someone’s ass.

And cut with more toxins

than the whole of the raw sewage lobby

combined.

About Ryan Quinn Flanagan:

Ryan Quinn Flanagan is a Canadian-born author residing in Elliot Lake, Ontario, Canada with his wife and many bears that rifle through his garbage.  His work can be found both in print and online in such places as: Evergreen Review, The New York Quarterly, Horror Sleaze Trash, In Between Hangovers, Red Fez, and The Oklahoma Review.