No more slogans, poet —
your great good words of theory
have no rhythm,
are no generator
to charge a rebel’s heart.

No more slogans, poet —
to change them make them feel
both bullet and healing,
scent of blood and of
lily on the casket.

No more slogans, poet —
your time is closing;
they may take you soon. What
do you think we need most now —
your flag, or your fist?

When I opened the door
to my wing of darker rooms,
I expected to let something out
but did not expect 
so much more to get in 
and make a home there.

When I broke into song
by the lake of fire, 
I expected to take heat
but I did not expect 
my lungs to become
so hard-scarred,
did not expect
my voice to become
so brittle.

When I eased my knives
back into the block
after butchering, I did not expect
that they would rattle me awake
night after night, hissing out
from their wooden slots,
“more, more, more…”

When I shook hands
with you, salt-hearted 
snake, rhymer for the offense,
herald and praiser of all that blood 
can destroy when it breaks loose,
I did not expect to end up
shaking for so long after
I let go of your hand.  
I did not expect you
to keep shaking me. Somehow,
I never expected
to become

such a weary fool,
such a well worn tool,
such a gleeful singer
of fire’s ancient song.

No darkness like
American darkness:

scalp in one fist, treaty in the other; it wears a stolen feather.

No darkness like American darkness.

We all know what’s under the bed; it wears a white hood.

No darkness like
American darkness:

it stinks of plastic
instead of ancient woods;

wears menace like a tumbling skyscraper,
not like a sacred mountain.

No darkness like
American darkness:

it doesn’t wear black,
but green;

it doesn’t even care
if you can see it.

to save tomorrow
we will have to
extend ourselves
beyond our skins

sabotage the tracks
we always ride upon
dance damage
in whirls of foul steam

breathe uncanny fumes 
from the mouth of hell
claim it for our cologne
waft it back at their sentinels

explain and explain
to ourselves
how we are the best church
we can belong to

how much self mastery
we shall need in the face
of the storms of laughter
from the throats of evil

coupled with abandonment
of our trivial principles of form
and substance just long enough
to shut that howling down

if we want to save tomorrow

In my pocket, 
my imaginary country,

a best version
of this one; I carry it

with me tightly 
wrapped in hope.

It’s currently populated by
dinosaurs who emerge

as gentle as 
a hurricane’s far-side

sunlight filtering into
destroyed 

familiarity. If you see
them lumbering

into your path you
will be instantly changed

and unsure: what
is this?

What sorcery is this
that cures

both extinction and
gigantism? If you 

mean that you want
to know and are not just 

disbelieving your own eyes,
I will

point simply at the hope
and say it’s been there

all along, the magic
which when worked

can change all,
raising the long-thought dead

from a pocket
where it’s been kept

safe against 
battering and bring it back

to a sustainable form
and thus save a ravaged landscape.

In the moment
of crisis called 
today —

not to say
that all moments
of every day do not contain 
crisis for someone —

not to say
that it has not always been so
and that it will not
always be so —

not to say 
that this crisis here is not
the result of someone preventing
their own crisis there — 

not to say
that some crisis has not been made
by someone to make their own life
comfortable —

not to say 
that in fact all these earthly crises
do not have a thread of preventability
and volition tacked on somewhere —

in this moment of crisis called today I
am looking up and seeing it all as a Calder,
a mobile swinging —

huge and weighty disguised as flight
and light but all suspended by a cord
thinner than one would imagine —

not to say
it is incapable
of holding it
any longer — 

not to say
it will surely fail shortly
and crash, 
killing or tearing up all — 

not to say
anything other than 
if it were given
a good shake,

today might as well
be renamed
The End.

If a cup of some
store-bought tea leaf-dust
is enough to calm you, you should

make a cup. If a moment
before the window, staring into
dirty city snow at drab birds,

is enough to make you feel
a stab of peace, by all means
be seated with your cup 

before the window. It’s OK
to turn off the news for a moment
and pretend that there’s nothing

to worry about, nothing to be done.
It’s all going to be terrible for a while yet
and there’s a lot for each of us to do —

but here you are and here’s the tea 
and those sparrows and no sun out there
so the gray snow for once matches the sky

and there’s no immediate war to fight —
sit, have a moment, no matter how engaged
your life has been you have a right

to stop now and then, to see now and then a reason
to turn back to the news and the struggle
and the work.  See how they are, those birds —

they often stand completely still
for a few seconds at a time
and still manage to fly when they need to fly.

The storm is later than was forecast.
The wind hasn’t yet begun to shift
the dunes on the Cape, there’s no snow yet
in the Worcester hills. People
will soon be complaining
about the weather report,
even though it has favored them
so far with its inaccuracy — damn,

don’t you love people? Don’t you find
them as ridiculous and adorable
as infant Tasmanian devils, baby
demons as cute as any little
flesh shredders could possibly be?

The Super Bowl was on last night.
Half the audience hates half the audience,
half hate the halftime show, half hate the
commercials, half hate
that it even happened at all — damn, 

don’t you just love people? Can’t you
see them in all their inscrutable glory
asking for absolution for every petty 
act of genocide they’ve ever assisted
through the practice of minor binaries
and trivial hatreds? 

In the meantime the bees are swarming
less and less and there are fewer to swarm
at all.  In the meantime the winds
are starting to change, ruffling fewer furs,
whistling over drier lakes, taking more
bomb dust with them. In the meantime
we’re waiting for the loitering storm – damn,

why don’t you love, people? It’s not as it
there much time left. What could it hurt
to try and love? Except for the proud legacy
of standing alone in a carefully selected crowd
of your well-conforming peers, there’s not much point
in hanging on to it. Why don’t you just adore us,
people, we the maddening mad people? How different
we are from each other, how very much the same?

Let’s discard the easy ways
used by too many: no hijacking,
sniping, spraying of bullets,
or strapping on of explosives
required for this.  First step instead

is to be unapologetic: as it is,
you are deadly enough as you are
to some. Your body is a terror
already to someone: look around,
see how hard they work to disarm

its sights, its smells, its presence.
See how they fight your natural being?
You can simply be that and do the job
well enough. To take it a step farther,
find an ally or two: a partner, a lover,

a friend — anyone who’ll step to the target
with you. We’ll say that no one needs to get hurt,
although no one believes that, really; someone
likely will. It may be you, it may be them,
maybe everyone will get hurt so don’t go there alone —

although it’s hard not to feel alone when racing toward
impact, it will be better when you know
there’s someone beside you, even if
all you have to reach for is an ancestor or a hero.
Take heart in knowing who carries your armor.

Lastly: it’s not hard to pick a target as they
present themselves so often, so casually, that 
it’s nearly impossible not to strike one daily, hourly,
second to second. You will barely be able
to stand after some of those cratering moments, slowed by

visible pain, invisible wounds, yet-unknown
long term effects. It’s not my place to tell you
to stand tall and take it; you will do what you do.
All I’m saying is that you will be a warhead 
without ever trying to be so it may be worth doing well.

Be whatever you were meant to be: sleek or stout,
dark or light, strangely obvious or as normal
and nondescript as a sheet of paper. Know 
your trajectory. Be ready to fly — and when you fly
you will land somewhere, so level it.