the gunshot crisp, startling a radiating crackle floating on the unusually warm autumn air
my dog bolts for the house, and once inside, takes cover under the desk – this is a natural response to explosives
fear, confusion, rage, sorrow course through my marrow — we are made of the same stuff
then i remember that deer-stalking-luring-and-killing with a gun season started today
i’d seen the dignified six-point buck head south earlier, the same direction of the blast / i realize that he may be dead, now
then i remember that i haven’t seen the doe and her playful and curious fawns in over a month’s time
on my way to the highway entrance ramp, i avoid the main roads where the bodies of two deer lay dead a half mile apart / i pretend they can’t be, that they aren’t my familiars /
the deer always seem to be lying just barely off the road
do they collapse and die there identically — or does someone drag them there by their legs or antlers; are there protocols for this? what does the weight of a dead deer body or dead human body feel like in the hands? are the dead heavier? would i be able to drag a deer or human body? maybe — in my heyday i have only ever held dead rabbits, squirrels, birds, fish in my own two hands
then i remember that our first dog was euthanized at home, in the back yard, in the June Sun, but it was not me who lifted and carried his body away / why didn’t i carry him? back then, i was in my strength heyday.
the Sun just keeps on shining setting and rising, setting and rising while the People of Palestine, of Congo, are genocided
the deception of the “life-bringer” Sun on yet another day of genocides
did you know that Yaldaboath only feigned dismay when Cain blew his own brother away; then He later told Abraham to kill his own son, just to prove that he was obsessed enough
you know, that dear Jesus in heaven comfortably stayed all throughout the Trans-Atlantic slave trade,
and that Allah had no problems with the Caliphates and The One True God was all about The Crusades
and that Creator ignored the prayers and the pleas of First Peoples slaughtered by steel, starvation, and European disease
and that Yahweh was pre-occupied during the Holocaust busy planning and inciting the Palestinians’ cruel loss
from Auschwitz to Al-Shifa, He so craves burnt offerings His global portfolio — built solely on dead things
He created the Sun to grow His tainted Seeds Horror by daylight, His Grand Design? — what a fucking death scheme
Auden once begged to “dismantle the Sun” for the loss of his own be-loved one
but Hark!
for the loss of our collective soul, dismantlement’s just not good enough, leave Him no parts, no plans to re-build and restart!
tell me, how do you calmly tell someone to “look, brake, stop, now, please” in a nano-second? calm but with desperate urgency? without amplification? without proselytizing? without the infusion or projection of panic? without the prescience of the future unfolding in the very moment?
tell me, i’ll wait,
while you kill the coyote
crossing the road
that crosses razed forest
clear-cut for runs and Aprés-ski, for lumber to build the 3-day-stay mansions – which they unironically call, “cabins,” a settlement of a pop-up-Bavaria™️ for them in the valley of the mountains of
the Sangre de Cristo?
the lifeblood of the Red Willows.
the very same road
to access the trailhead to the pristine glacial lake with views of Taos Peak
a profanity of epithets
“williams” lake
“wheeler” peak
where you go, unironically,
to briefly escape
this World, the violence of this World, your World
Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica” reimagined/colorized for the horrific and ruthless bombing of Gaza and the genocide of of the Palestinian People by the State of Israel, armed and supported by the United States & Western World derivative work, artist unknown
gifted handwritten poem art from one of my newest and dearest friends, Lajuana Lampkins as my longest and dearest friend, Jill Johnston Hayes neared death
an illuminated scroll drawn on gold metallic cardstock with pen, marker, paint and crayon Lajuana Lampkins September 2023
FOREVER “you”… My childhood friend, and through the years, we've grown together, shared joy and tears, were bonded like the day and night, our hearts forever will unite, you've given me, a chance to be, a friend forever, most definitely, I am forever, there is no end, you'll always be, my most best friend, each day and night, I keep you near, always know, that I am here. Thank you for, the love you've shared, nothing else can compare, So much we've grown, and been all through, forever is forever you.