Sunday, June 03, 2007

After Watching the Evening News

My brother asks, "Why write poetry?"

Belly swollen with hunger,
hands and mouths empty,
a little boy climbs into his bed of straw
during a commercial on TV.

Down the street, the corner shop
owned by D & M,
where I used to walk the dog
closes its doors as the light
pores from the neon Walmart sign.
Blinding.

Darfur. Colombian floods. Abducted children.
Gun laws. Rising housing costs, wars neither won
or lost, election candidates that all look the same,
a new reality TV show. Divorce rates. All escape from the
MSNBC stream of verbal ambiguity.

But when my brother looks at me,
I reply with all my heart,

"I don't want to live in a world without poetry."

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