I Plucked an Apple

-The world is a no good place full of no good people 

standing in lines at the market or queueing endlessly in uneven rows 

like lambs led to the no good slaughter to a no good god and its getting hotter 

no good clothes in a no good winter no solace in our shoes just more blues 

and watching the light rise above the no good mountains 

and it's even hotter 

over in Ukraine and Russia where they throw large stones at each other 

drown themselves in the Dnipro River 

(no good) 

trying to starve out people with no power gather them in corners 

like sheep to a no good slaughter who bleat and stutter 

weapons trade hands everyone sees it we watch the rich get richer 

and goddamn it’s getting hotter 

(no good) 

hands on throats now in Israel and the terror her face as she’s torn away 

in Be’eri in the desert with when no good men shot up a bunch of kids on drugs 

and it gets yet hotter 

(no good) 

China mock charges on Taiwan and it gets hotter 

poor being lined up in uneven rows conscripted to be led 

like rams led to the no good slaughter 

it gets hotter and more and more hands 

are on the triggers more irons are in the fire as  

father Putin dissolves the ban against the bomb 

fuck me and f**k us all it seems like everyone has forgotten 

the destruction and I know that now Nagasaki is a party town 

dressed in neon and background nuclear hum 

we should maybe take off our clothes go naked like when born as we are led 

by ugly hands made of no good dollars 

against our no good will 

lions led to the slaughter 

hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter 

and yet 

 

-And yet 

from a  

laden bough 

of my mother’s tree 

I plucked  

a green ripe apple 

filled with 

cool juice 

it was 

just as sweet 

as I imagined

it would 

be.