Karate Small Fires
Within the influence of innocence, you were dressed to
kill.
Pulling styles from the atmosphere, you could have
dressed us all.
As we surrendered to the worn jets, "impossible to
crash, impossible to fail", like the dim lights on the
dash, as we were pulling out of anywhere on any other
road.
Now I can tell by the way the rain hits the glass that
it wants to be cold. It wants to be snow.
Is it falling there, obscuring small fires that deign
another shining front-page spread, where old worn men
conspire?
So much for Saturdays and other days when lives are at
stake.
God forgive us for the hatred, for the risks that we
take. Boys forget promises from both coasts.
What would it take to get out now?
Is this what they call the end? Are we sleeping on a
dark star?
Is this some saint we all forgot?
Is she burning in a parked car?
Violence is so slow, and the patience will do us in.
So mothers, stop looking for your sons in the wood,
because you will find them on CNN.
That's when you will try, but you can't evict the sun.
It lights on one hour, every morning, every day, when
you know you are the one.
