Scrape the plate and be trained
on the diphthong in phoebe
the glorious “Is this what
my life has come to?”
asked again and again
but less often
once you never had the confines
of “pregnancy prevention”
sleeping in separate beds from your lover
in mid-twenties to call out
a book about the book of Revelations
acknowledges every generation
has reason enough to believe time
will come to an end in that generation
or surely the next because how else
can adherers of the code justify killing
all the ones demanding the last of patriarchy?
If they knew what we know
they’d let tears over the birth
of every little Walter & Maggie
whisper the miracle of stars and galaxies
rivulets tasting salty along their cheeks
the phone rings and on the line is
my son, a son of humanity, a son of God
telling things of the mythic beauty of daughters
which
finally
fall
like
droplets
of
unisex
rain.
Published by – The Midwest Quarterly