Force Majeure
The sun's mother touch caresses dead faces
whilst fre rides the wind to our homes.
Hear words screamed guttural through the scarred air:
no peace, not ever.
My compassionate dreams wither
when the blood-dam bursts.
In bed now there are no stars,
just glints of iron and
still oceans, a lone voice bouncing
of slate cell walls.
One must learn to calm the thrashing of the animal
for this is a world of
1,000
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Catadioptric
Our stubborn afection in the faces
of so many voices of hate,
any sort of spell to help us rise above
the violent chatter in our hearts.
The senseless struggle pissed into darkness,
aimless disease of the rotting everyday
just begging for something noble & stupid to die for
but here again are the postcards, the letters, the calendar pages
torn & pasted into uniform black notebooks,
sigils scrawled on bedroom walls,
something fitting between my eyes
that I can't explain.
A million men lying beautifully with my tongue.
Numberless lives writhing
within and behind me,
none of them my own.
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Daily Commute
Politely step around the man asleep on the sidewalk
who could be dead. Politely step around the genocide.
Politely step around police brutality, grocery store price gouging,
and gambling apps for kids. Politely step around the imprisoned slave labour
that picks the wheat for your bread & makes the packaging it is sold in,
all funded & supported with the fruits of your labour. Politely
step around the grotesque, churning machinery; it is not your turn yet.
Politely step around the daydreams of oblivion, the roaring fre,
the hot gore webbing between your fngers.
Politely step around your perpetual desire to die and the messaging about what that makes you.
Politely step around the stormtroopers and their guns.
Politely step around the dismembered toddlers, the singed bones of their parents,
and the distant screams of their unimportant relatives.
Politely step around the fact that this is wrought in your name, that you exist
completely at odds with every one of these demons surrounding you,
that there is no way out that doesn’t take us all down frst.
Politely step around the barricade
and go down with something heavy & sanguine in your hands.
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C is a working class writer & musician from Philadelphia. Donate to Palestinians in need.