Scent: 
grand trigger,
concealed weapon, 
unexpected clue.

Standing on
a corner, watching
pale people 
walk by:
some solo and
others in pairs
crushing tight
under umbrellas
in light rain.

I smell them
going by. I
smell their fear,

can almost understand
if not sympathize — 

yet thereafter
step out
unprotected:
less than concerned
with my own imminent
drenching

as I’m too familiar
with that
to fear it;
no concern for 
whatever future bullet
that smell might foretell;

those pale folks
don’t have a clue
what a deluge
feels like, 

while I’ve lived under one
my whole life.

As terrified of glitter
as if it were poison,
those boys dance around
with sticks in their fists,

claiming they are impervious
to fear. Claiming birthrights
and heritages they’ve made up,
devoid of sweetness and flash,

these boys prepare a sham parade
for their false history of a future country
whose only social rituals
will be shouting matches and funerals.

Terrified of glitter and resentful
of rainbows, this clump of boys — 
this clot of twisted ball sweat, this lump
of damage and lost anger — 

steps up smartly to their idiot march.
If there’s a God, God will surely toss
a handful of shine behind them to clean up
the stink they leave behind.

applauding themselves,
pretending that sound 
is the call of the hands of God,

pretending so hard and so well
they begin to think
themselves divine,

forgetting they are as human
as the executed and imprisoned
whose pain they claim to sanctify,

turning down the sound
of their own frightened breathing
and covering their eyes as Death begins

taking all those they’ve demonized, as Fear
begins dragging all those they’ve targeted
and stigmatized into the Dark,

not recognizing that Darkness 
is their own long shadow,
not seeing how it hangs behind them,

following them with every step,
swallowing all their perceived divinity whole
before choking on it and spitting it out.

Repetition of 
“not my fault”

produces no magic,
no spelled-out protection

from consequences.
A chant of “what’s past

is past” builds
no walls, forges no shields

for this past-molded
present moment.

“No one alive today…”
means nothing at all 

when all we do
depends on a country

founded by the dead
and still ruled by

what they wanted to hold
in their once-hot little hands.

They did make us what we are
but we only have to live that way

until we decide to wake up
and live as those truly living should:

in this moment,
this time, facing this day

as it is, knowing
what has passed without 

bowing and scraping 
before it as if it owned

all we are
and could ever be.

Too done yesterday with the state of things
not to put my better time into
trying to forget it all today.

I’ve got peppers to tend
and tomatoes to stake.
Might be a summer squash or two

to see, and from that look I might predict
when ripeness might take hold.
I’ll plan, or maybe daydream,

that first meal with them:
perhaps stir fried in a thick bath
of butter and garlic, tossed loose

and hot onto a plate with 
whatever’s easy
and quick that day.

The summer squash
so long anticipated will be the highlight
and whatever else the meal offers

will scarcely matter
on that night
when the news will undoubtedly be

worse or at least no better 
than today’s news. But
the summer squash will be 

better than that. Better than
the end of the world,
if it hasn’t already come and gone by then.

After the murders and fires
had cleared the land,
I was strenuously invited
by the arsonists and killers
to enter
Their House
and stay.

I looked in through
the back door —
the only one open to me —

at stains,
smoke-sullied windows,
a clutter of weapons
and waste,

then turned back toward 
the ruins of the countryside
where green and gold
were preparing to run riot
after timid beginnings.

From inside they called after me
with hope and threats
as I walked
a good distance from 
Their House
and began to tend 
to wounded land
and water, doing

what I could do,
knowing what was to come
would likely take me
but would still be better than 
how I would die
in Their House.

Love those social media posts
with the guillotines and shiny blades
With the red and the brown and the clever names

You’ve got that Revolutionary Style

Never touch a gun, never touch a knife
Wave a little banner, paint a little sign
Locked to a front door while they open the back

You’ve got that Revolutionary Style

Gotta dig that T shirt, gotta like your scarf
Gotta get me a whole bunch of stuff like that
Gotta get the right look for the march or the war

Gotta get that Revolutionary Style

Call it out lock him up lock him up lock him up
lock him up lock him up LOCK HIM UP
Incarceration is a crime but there are exceptions

when you’ve got that Revolutionary Style

In the haze of a burning planet
In the haze of a burning city
In the haze of the thickened gunsmoke
over bodies not yet cold
In the cries of the people seeking relief
In the steam of the oceans filling with heat
In the fear of the white fog filling the streets
where the future is bought and sold
In the moments before it all falls down
In the hours before you can’t and won’t
It’s a mystery to me how good you look
as you swing for the whirlwind cross

You’ve got that Revolutionary Style
and there’s gotta be a meme for that