Come in, friend,
to this humble camp;
I will serve you
the national drink
of my people in honor
of you, my guest.
If you have one of your own
and you have one with you
you may drink up if you
have any with you —
should you share some
with me, I would be
most grateful; if you do not,
then drink freely of mine.

Sit down, be comfortable!
These lovely blankets 
I’ve piled upon the floor
in this corner make a fine cushion.
I received them in trade
for something — oh, I can’t recall
now what I gave up in exchange
for these. So much I’ve traded
for comfort — but you, 
you sit. We can talk more
of such things in due time.

Tell me something
about yourself — your language,
your children. Tell me something
about your lands — your customs,
your children. The gold you are wearing,
your customs, your curious thoughts
of God, your gold.

I will tell you of mine
after we eat.

You’ve brought food, I see.
This is good of you; I must confess
we are hungry here, but do not fear for us.
That is not your concern — we 
have always been hungry. Perhaps
we could have some of yours, just until
we learn more of what is here 
and what can come from this land — 
what grows well, where the water
flows freely, what game is
plentiful, how much things 
cost. How much gold
you need to survive, how much 
you have. How much
do you have? 

I see you’ve suddenly
grown silent, wary,
staring into darkness.

Please don’t mind that shadow
behind me, moving
in ways you say you’ve not seen.
That is always there. We sprout them
from our backs at birth. 

You say you don’t have one?
You’ve never seen such a thing?  

Oh, we all have them.
I’m sure you have your own.
I can help you find yours.

In fact, I insist. 

A guest in my doorway
asking if it is safe
to come inside
and stay for a while.

I tell them it has never
felt safe in here, certainly
no safer than it is
out there. 

Are you sure, 
I ask? Are you sure?
Out there you can at least
run. In here

there’s nowhere to run
if what’s out there
decides to enter by force,
and I have proven 

to be terrible 
at homeland defense. 
Also, my judgment
is terrible. I’m not saying

more than that,
not saying
I do not trust
my guests, but…

The guest
raises a hand and
looks at me, hard,
as I am raising my own:

am I pushing them back?
Inviting them in?
Friendship, warning,
both? Each of us hesitates

while the world continues
to end. The question
remains: where is there ever
such safety as we desire

that flight or fight can leave our minds
for a second and we know
a raised hand will always be
a gesture of peace?

hunters senators and
this year’s pickleballers

that’s who runs this joint — 
well-armed killers happy to kill

lawyers rich and fat with
self importance and

fad-obsessed sporty types
who won’t be on these courts 

next year 
they might be just lovely people

or they might be shits
but no one’s ever gonna know

for sure
once they move on to whatever’s next

Cutting from one point of view
to another, heaving aside
opinions in favor of other opinions…
where are your eagle, your raven,
your dove now, old friend?
All anyone can hear in this twilight
is an owl and it sounds like your name,
your butchered name being called.
This is how you get lost:
you give up every familiar being
in favor of a ghost call. You chase
hooting into darkness thinking
it’s an anthem and there will be a home
wherever you meet them but
all that’s there
is pine needled earth and a hole lined
with a flag to wrap around you for a shroud.
A flood is coming. Jump in
and save yourself. Maybe this time,
maybe in this vulture time,
water will not seek its lowest level.

Fed up
with poverty,

too hungry
to fight.

Question
of the day

is how to
get full,

how to 
mix it up,

how to raise
a fist 

when you are
too feeble

to make one
yourself? 

You get someone
to give you a bite

of something,
anything really, 

and then 
take your hand,

fold the fingers in,
close the thumb over,

and with great care
help you

put it in the air.
They stand behind you

and hold you up
even as your knees shake

and you think
you cannot go on.

To move from fed up
to fed, you must first see

that you
cannot do it alone.

As it was back 
when we were young, 
but now we see it;

as it was back
when we were blind,
but now we feel it;

this town’s got a few citizens
and a lot of inhabitants.
Very few ever cross over

from just sleeping here
and mowing the lawn
to being here and present.

This is how it has been
all the time we have been in this place.
People let the town happen

and hang the consequences
unless they are direct and personal.
That’s how the whole country happens,

in fact: in spite of, not because. 
So little is intentional.
It’s a town doing town things

in a country 
which has slipped into
something more comfortable,

as it was back
when we were blind to it,
but now we feel it prodding 

something sharp into 
our backs. As it was back
when we were young,

before we could see
how few ever think of this town
as home for anyone unlike them. 

Once villains die
someone reframes their portraits,
puts them in something plain,
then rehangs them in a gallery
named “The Innocent.”

The old gallery is painted
then refilled.  
It is renamed 
“No One Alive.”

Every few minutes
someone comes along
and wipes up
the blood on the floor below
all the portraits
in all the galleries.
Everything is 
spotless.

Meanwhile some kid
is dying in a village or a slum
and the mother is wondering
who to blame, or even if there is
blame to be assigned.

is one of those games that people
delight in playing. They squeal
when it’s pulled off the shelf.

A game about which people say,
“It’s just fun. It doesn’t matter 
who wins.” They smile, 

such happy cutthroats,
playing pickpockets at a medieval 
festival. It’s just fun.

and how the clueless smiles add
to the joy. No one could possibly
mistake this for a true battle.

Then again, I don’t squeal
or smile much on my good days
so it always feels like it’s our blood

in the offing for some of us — 
those seated at the game board
with no pockets to pick, no blades to swing.

I saw the edge of my world 
in the face of a border-trapped child
on a screen, and shut it off at once.

Someone’s going to blame me
for doing nothing,
for turning away. I feel the same

or at least I used to
until the images
became so familiar

I could tell at once they were not current,
that the borders in question
were not my own, the child 

in the scene died in a camp
or on a reserve decades before my birth
and I needn’t care anymore as they were

beyond my sympathy. I am beyond
my sympathy now, for that matter.
I admit I’m garbage who happens to be

alive in the now
on the right side
of the barbed wire fences. What a time

to be alive, in fact: the powerful
have made it easy to deny such hungry eyes
the courtesy of simply looking back.

It’s not real, I tell myself. It’s deepfake,
photoshop, propaganda. The sound
of the rumbling gut, the stare — all 

pulled from history, remade
for today’s eyes. It’s not as if
nothing ever changes

on that side of the barbed wire.  That kid
will be alright and pain free one way
or another, one day, no matter how I see them today.

Old song, “ Chimes Of Freedom,”
playing. I’m sleepy. I don’t want
such bells to wake me. I sit here
and pretend this is not happening. 

Someone laughs at what’s happening.
Someone else wrings their hands about it.
I’m annoyed by both, but I’ve been
too comfortable to move away. None of this

should be happening, not where I’m
trying to sleep. The music and the 
sneering and the earnest exhortations.
How dare they keep me awake? 

Old song, “Which Side Are You On?”
playing now.  I’m still sleepy,
annoyed, uncomfortable. 
Someone’s getting hurt if this continues.

The songs are old news, but still news.
This keeps happening, 
and even when people get hurt
people like me stay sleepy. 

Old song, “Rock-A-Bye Baby,”
playing now. I’m sleepy again,
even in my discomfort. I’d rather
not be awake but it keeps happening.