American Parable


Once, there was a country
where pale people were afraid.
They had weapons and beauty 
of open spaces, prairie grass 
and forests, river runs and rolling
golden mountains. It is said 
the pale people kissed the faces 
of their children, raised their flags, 
loved their dogs. Word spread 
that terrible things were shambling 
towards them. Creatures that would 
destroy their factories, that would 
spawn more creatures to take over 
their land, that would give away 
their food and fire wood leaving 
them with nothing but rusting 
tractors and the endless cycle 
of news flickering from enormous 
screens. Be afraid, the faces said, 
so they were until a prophet 
who lived in a golden tower said, 
I will save you, and the pale people 
fell at his feet though he never really 
left his golden tower. Throw your 
rocks at those people, he said. 
They are to blame, he said, so stones 
flew at people who shared their land, 
who kissed the faces of their children, 
who raised their flags, who loved 
their dogs, but who were different. 
The prophet erected a wall and all 
the worshipers huddled on one side. 
They were not wrong about a Grendel 
slavering towards them, though it was 
amorphous, like a fog of plagues, 
and it could easily scale any wall 
because it was not human after all. 
The others left on the far side of the wall 
heard the knell of a bell they already
knew, lit their torches, and plunged 
into the darkness, familiar as they were 
with the art of survival. It was time
to get to work. 
 




refugee


dear melania you can rest
awhile we know you rode
hard across the wasteland
to climb over this wall and
melania let us water your 
horse let us send for your
only son hush now melania
no more tears put your head 
in my lap and I’ll untangle
those brambles from your 
hair just think no more 
injections melania no more 
blue pills and morning catches 
in our forest like a struck 
match while night falls exactly 
unlike a rolling up of tinted
windows and more like the way
slovenian woods pull their 
shutters closed at the end
of the day melania you must
be hungry like a mail-order
bride so we insist you eat 
this bread then wash in
the brook you can sleep on
your escape because you will
have to get used to such a lack
of hands in you melania
your bed is over there