No more metaphors.
As if a dead human child
can be compared to anything
except a dead human child.
No more fruits and flowers
masking the scent of
fear of talking about death.
Not death from old age or disease,
but death en masse,
       death numbing,
       death incomprehensible.
When I self-soothe before bed
by scrolling past severed limbs,
I have nothing poetic to say
that deserves posting.
Suddenly everything is “revolutionary”
except revolution itself.
It’s the secret I’ve kept
to my self for years,
the desire for bloodshed
to end all bloodshed.
No more innuendos or
insinuations, no
insidious lies that hide
behind shame.
Poetry isn’t resistance.
Sleep isn’t resistance.
Love isn’t resistance.
Resistance is resistance,
and violence is violence.
I cannot say I understand war,
and so it feels easy to conflate
the discomfort of confusion with
having your home destroyed,
your family murdered,
your brother jailed.
When I speak of fascism,
I’m not speaking of gas prices.
I’m speaking of the
hundreds upon hundreds
of men and women
who talk backwards into
microphones, lying
ferociously to get rich.
It’s not about overpopulation;
though the poor will be eradicated
before poverty ever is.
But I still hesitate
and bury my own hope
with pretense of futility.
There may not be
a choice to say it tomorrow
if today I self-censor.
We are not trees but
entire forests.
Nothing is inevitable.