I don’t care how any of us die, no
Method is king over madness of believing in our immortality
Don’t care if it’s from gun or blade or germ
Don’t care but don’t want it to happen too soon
But know it will happen and I wish you could see it as I do
As wave of the star enveloping, sick as you are
As wave of the earth encompassing, wounded as you are
As wave of the wind embracing, struck down as you are
And the next minute moment second instant it must be   — not this
As NOT THIS as any moment ever
All I want to know about that moment I cannot know
So I sit here speaking of death with intense fingers tapping
Oh the damn notion of all of us having to wait
You wait as you will but I will be calm and resigned to it
Call for tacos and pizza and meats and cigarettes to be delivered unto me
By horse and by helicopter and by men who have made that a living
I don’t care how any of them die, no
Don’t care how any of them live
Method is king over judgment of such trivia
How we die is trivia
And every death I’ve ever known has been trivial
And every individual an inconsequential body gone
Except as wave of earthquake to those who love them, dead as they are
I am the broken acolyte of continuance
Death ate me out a long time ago
And now what I yearn for is method of choice
As wave of desire punctures reluctance, weird as I am
In this country devoted to living forever
To never eating the sick bulletins of unconscious satisfactions
I don’t care how any of us live, no
Live and let live is here practiced as apathy not compassion
Does it look the same when it’s not about love but instead about disinterest
I don’t care how anyone anywhere dies, no
Do you think that is awesome or troubling or false
Wave of suspicion engendering a breakdown, such as I am
Such as you are, come as you are, come correct to the throne of mirrors
AMERICA the hall of just in time history
AMERICAN is the holler the chorus the cadence
American the man in the trembling suit
AMERICAN the gun in the hand of the — what is he today anyway
Cowboy over Indian, soldier over prisoner, boss over peon
Vigilante songs in the heart of every person
We don’t care how others die as long as the lettuce stays crisp
Method is ghost, is memory, is suggested mask for the inevitable
I am wearing the mask of a wave all-encompassing
I am wearing the mask of a wave of righteousness
I am wearing the mask askew from its moorings
I will take off ths mask and look at you
I am the wallflower with back to the fourth wall
Are you behind me watching the others
Are you in front of me on a player’s mark
I don’t care how you die if it makes sense to the plot, no
I don’t see your death as being all that interesting, no
I don’t see how the rockets and twilight should lead to dawn’s early light

Imagine a place
where no one
ever gets shot

or
barring that
a place
where no one gets shot
without deserving it
or asking for it 

Imagine that someone 
in that place
got shot
without asking for it
and at last
we were all ashamed

How could it be
we would call to each other
that
someone got shot
without asking for it  

Imagine that we then tried
to rename the place
as Country Without Guns
and Earth
as Rock Without Guns

Imagine that we tried to do that

Who do you think
would show themselves then

What big bad wolves would rise
to fight us on the change

How long would we tolerate 
their unrepentance
and ravening

They’d be asking for it
but
we couldn’t shoot them

Would we have to drive them back with rocks
like we did in the old days
like we did back home
or
would we threaten them
with whatever was at hand
with wallets
with CD cases
with ice tea bottles
with bags of candy

They must know how ridiculous that would be
Killing a man with a wallet or a bottle of tea
Maybe on the Rock Without Guns it might be possible

But here there ARE guns
so
here
we go 
again