Getting Messed Up During The Late News

I’ve forgotten this morning
how right it felt last night
to grab a drink or three
as missiles fell over there.

It must have been something, 
fire splashing up from ground to sky
the way whisky’s heat came surging
from gut to chest.

I’ve forgotten this morning
how right it felt last night
to smoke, a thick layer in my air
like a pall above a bomb crater. 

It must have been something there,
wreckage obscured by haze, people
scrambling to take cover at first, slowly
taking stock afterward — counting, recounting.

I’ve forgotten this morning
about last night and what felt right,
or wrong, or scary, or justified
by logic or magic, flag or cash.

It must be something there,
everyone wondering how hell
could possibly be different,
could possibly be worse.

I wake up in selfish mourning 
that I have such certain luxury here 
to imagine all hell is overseas, to pretend
I am not myself a demon

for getting
messed up
during
the late news

then waking in the morning
to damn others for last night
when all I wanted to do
was not feel my own finger

on those buttons,
those triggers, the pulse points
on all the bodies over there
that have ever gone cold.