ten people standing in line waiting for bread--
obliterated
this is not a poem
this is oblivion
a nightmare
Hieronymus Bosch
here one moment
and what?
gone the next
inconceivable?...
but YOU MUST conceive of it
marinate on THE BLOOD
until the reality seeps into your psyche
can you do it?
is there enough empathy left in your pinkie
in your pre-frontal cortex
in your reptilian brain
in your worst imagining
to wrap your NEEDFUL concentrated thought around IT?
I see
ten mushroom clouds EXPANDING
I see
spontaneous combustion AND TEN INDIVIDUAL POOFS
I see
ten memorials and malingering remembrances
AND AN ENDLESS CLOTHESLINE OF DAMP HAN-KERCHIEFS
I see Pale Grief in her flesh-tone gown
and Death with his scythe
cutting down the chafe and the wheat
no harvest for this year
not for ten
who were simply hungry....
and no bread
CERTAINLY no bread
for those who ONCE hailed from
the Bread Basket Of The World
and whose bodies hailed all over
the broken coffins of ground.
Are you quiet now?
Do you have any words or images left?
(whispering: Where and what is peace?)
LEGAL COPYRIGHT FOR THIS POEM WRITTEN DIRECTLY TO THE PAGE
AND ALSO FOR THIS WRITER/POET MELISSA A. HOWELLS
AND ALSO FOR THIS LEGALLY COPY-WRITTEN AND REGISTERED SITE TITLE:
MELOO STRAIGHT FROM HER TILT-A-WORLD
