Fourteen, one-forty—what’s the difference
Besides concision? Lines, characters, syllables,
It’s all just counting (0101). Sense
Spills through little tubes its billion baubles.
Until it doesn’t. We, the fat, fail. The grid
Fails, satellites fall. We thumb dumb texts
To a sky that does not answer. Even God
Looks away. Our guns don’t save us. What’s next?
Outside, first, the traffic, actual, smelly,
And grass—the beautiful uncut hair of graves.
So nature again, and death, and people yelling
At each other, vibrating air. Then it all caves
To the artist incising with sharpened bone
Her bison—those next one hundred forty strokes.
-- Robert Schultz
Besides concision? Lines, characters, syllables,
It’s all just counting (0101). Sense
Spills through little tubes its billion baubles.
Until it doesn’t. We, the fat, fail. The grid
Fails, satellites fall. We thumb dumb texts
To a sky that does not answer. Even God
Looks away. Our guns don’t save us. What’s next?
Outside, first, the traffic, actual, smelly,
And grass—the beautiful uncut hair of graves.
So nature again, and death, and people yelling
At each other, vibrating air. Then it all caves
To the artist incising with sharpened bone
Her bison—those next one hundred forty strokes.
-- Robert Schultz
