A tide of vodka blood syringes empty shells
skeleton on a sandbar
beer cans rolling in seaweed and tar,
red star rising in a camouflage sky
the scimitar moon inclines
Orthodox priests behind tanks declare
Broken all, all are guilty of crimes
against nature and love– take what you ignore
not by the neck or tail
by the red horns and ride
into the hangman’s noose the chair
the mustard gas, white sheets in a coroner’s lab
the axe the rack the guillotine
move in the oppressive air of the Third Rome
radioactive Chernobyl
graves of Bucha, poppies of Lorraine
The beams of crucifixion burning on your lawn–
Cock your nose at the new Czar, blow him
your biggest raspberry
smack his face with rosaries
if that’s all you can do, you Hippies.”
To say world peace is impossible is not despair
it’s barely a revelation— how long
before the next war, next shooter boils over?
Hexed by our own, we can’t even stop
the murder of our kids at home
money flowers prayers we send
amid the mass confusion of Fox and CNN.
