how it is with old habits. The scientist,

hauled to the Capitol to justify

his new particle lab, finally spit out

CONGRESSMAN, IT HAS NOTHING

TO DO WITH DEFENDING

OUR COUNTRY, EXCEPT TO MAKE

OUR COUNTRY WORTH DEFENDING.

Yes, it is our duty, here on the home

front, to ensure there is always

a new thing to kill and die for.

A heartier engine, a stickier resin,

a toothier starlet, a stonier statue,

a seamier alley in which you and I

might meet. A livelier, more festive

substitute for party balloons. Consider

ditching the Mylar and replacing

with paper bunting, replacing with

ivy or drumming or the smell

of something burning. Consider

replacing with high-end

angular haircuts. Consider replacing

with invitees being waited on

by serfs. Consider replacing with

colorful yet orderly mass

suicide—just make it enough

of a regular thing, and the children

won’t know what they’ve missed.

During the Strife, My Sisters

During the Strife, My Sisters

began to stage an old play

about how women, by holding back sex,

could force the armistice

THE ONLY WEAPON WE HAVE—

and others of my sisters,

infuriated, stormed the stage in protest

singing how can you announce this is all

we are

receptacles

when women are out there mapping

the marshland, scrambling

the phone lines, bombs in our pockets,

rushing the roadblock

THE ONLY WEAPON WE HAVE—

sisters, can’t we meet here in the middle

fuck them all, bear their sons

then spirit the babies into the woods,

leave them to waste in the bramble

and then we walk away spitting and grinding

our boots in the mud and tracking

it everywhere

And Also with You

And Also with You

The comet taught us how to watch the war.

The comet contended that fire

is romantic and recommended we each behold it alone,

envisioning out there somewhere our next

lover, craning up at this same sky.

Was the comet simply endeavoring

to keep us divided, we asked it, and the comet

did not reply. Then we discovered the men

who wanted us dead

were convening at night on the site where their hero

had been unceremoniously

interred. And so we exhumed the guy, burned him up,

and fed his ash to the rapids,

to be churned into marlstone and mud-rich

air. Good thinking. Now he’s everywhere.

Good Description

Good Description

Lord I am such a narcissist—I couldn’t

even give a good

description, having been thinking only

of myself and what

in my body was breaking and how unmendable

the break, thinking only of

myself and with what archaic charge

was I complying, crying over and over NO,

as though to reduce confusion

as to whether I’d given permission,

when nobody, for that, would give

permission—I mean only

a true narcissist would expect to be faithfully

obeyed, and Lord I

am such a narcissist—I think I am so

charming, so kittenish and cultured,

uproarious at parties,

enlivening conversations with my extensive