alphabet-line style poem. i cheat a little bit for x, but whatevs. it's hard not to! =P

"He boasted that he would burn up my territory, and kill my young men with the sword, and dash my infants to the ground, and seize my children as booty, and take my virgins as spoil." -- Judith 16:4, New Oxford Annotated

Judith 16:4

“An axe falls every day,” I say.
“Better you than me.” (You have
coughed into your hand and mis-
directed me to the charnel house.) How
easy it is
for you to disregard suffering. I
gather firewood made of
hope and burn them to cinderlings.
In case the flames overstep
(Jealousy has me
kicking the door of ignorance down. It spreads,
like leprosy, this virus of
melancholy.) simply roll on them until they burn out.
“New ways
of dying are being invented
pretty much every day,” I blather, danger
quickening my veins.
“Understanding that will help.” I project
verisimilitude onto you
when I can get away with it.
(Yet maybe mistakes don't e-
xist exactly, but,
zooming in, are purposeful after all.)

Published June 26, 2011 Write a comment
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John X. McCullagh
I like these alphabet line poems
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