what happens when pop culture gets too much in my brain

Pure Unevil

Somewhere in Milwaukee an ironic teenager
is putting a kazoo into his R. Kelly remix
On YouTube a highwayman shoots horses
in the face and throws his money in the air
Jack Bauer throws a civilian out of his truck
like he just doesn't care
"Don't get up" he says
The man does not get up

The black bars on the top and bottom of my screen are normal
Certain advanced features may not play on all machines
There will be blood

Checking IMDB I realize the adaptation of The Stranger is not real
I dreamed it
It was set during the time of Jesus
Of Nazareth
Werner Herzog gave me a data CD showing all of the wardrobe choices
They were very bold
Ridley Scott was going to direct

On TV the Pope wears clothes that look like the inside of a coffin
He throws his Pope-a-rang from his Popemobile
at a reporter as a joke
But his laughter is mistranslated from German into English
as an insult to the Yankees
and he is tasered by security
with a ruthless hilarity suitable for millions of web hits

A cynical Emory grad working for CNN smiles
genuinely at the headline he writes ('Pope Goes Viral')
and forgets momentarily his desire
to hobble George Lucas

Jack Bauer eats a hamburger
Jack Bauer downloads a plugin
into a microchip on his arm
He flies into my room and watches me sleep

Jack Bauer is scaring me
just a little
Like his beard could just take off
from his face and become my uncle
My cousin finally discovered fashion
in anorexia and played Red Hot Chili Peppers
on the way to the graveside service

Californication is a sin in the latest graphic novel
adaptation of the Bible made possible
by my secretly Baptist church
where I paid $14 dollars for a book
on the Selfless Christian Revolution
after stopping by the coffeeshop
for some higher grounds

Jack Bauer is his own church
Jack Bauer defeats scientology
He has already cured Tom Cruise's unborn future son
of his dyslexia
and latent homosexuality/infertility

When Jack Bauer dies I will be distraught
on all of the relevant message boards
like with Reagan
My roommate will continue in his search
for epistemological truth
and out of print Criterion DVDs

But when my wireless dies I am not sad
I go outside with my neighbor
who screams sometimes at the internet I think

The sun sets in the west
just like Wikipedia says
I have proof recorded on my cell phone
I upload the video and play it at night

Over and over the sun drops
looking almost beautiful
like it belongs in a Terrence Malick film

Nina Myers I forgive you come back