Crime poetry weekly
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MURDER ONE The loneliness she felt, watching him leave, knowing he would be with another woman, didn't bother her. She remembered how her body ached after he beat her the night before. Left in their palace in the country, she found she could pretend to be happy while she calmly planned exactly how and when he was going to die. Her act was easy to understand when you live like this. The story
CUTTING ROOM FLOOR Someday, maybe in a country that lets people criticize other countries openly, there will be a film featuring the next Jesse Eisenberg-type as a wretched tech bro with our Social Security numbers in a flash drive mixing in his pocket full of Gold Cards pre-paid in full for future Trump voters. We'll get to witness his Zack Snyder-style slo-mo beating to millions cheering. But
WOUND US ALL It’s there. It’s still there, just under, seething, ready to explode, to rise up, shed the ugly evil laminate that has slimed over its soul like pond scum. It wants to rid itself of the rot, the spineless that represent it, the inhumanity of the demons pulling the strings, applying an agent ice that will traumatize for generations. It’s there. It’s still there, just below the
JACK, THE HACK CARJACKER Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack leaped over the gear-change stick. Jack be bonkers, Jack be dim: Hotwires engine Keys still in! Carjacker needs money, though should’ve rehearsed: Shifts in a hurry — right into REVERSE! Carjacker be nervous; Quite out of his gourd. PANIC engulfs him: A Baby On Board! Jack flees car and babe… Thus, in his defense: T’was Thief —not
FOREVER CHEMICALS I suspect something in the garden is killing me. Pulling out the dead stalks on hands and knees. Dried larkspur pods pour over black grains. Poppies' big hard ovaries shake. Salt and pepper bombs burst. Take cover. Anoint me valley, table, cup. Me thinks purple as in waves of grain and deep-sleep red—-as in fields of dorothy— neurotoxic psoriasis. By what authority do the
A MAN DREDGED A RIVER an 18-ton digger slicing through the water sediment hurled away leaving the salmon and trout and bullhead and minnows gasping the otters and mink scurrying the kingfisher and sand martin's bellies empty a man dredged a river stripped every wildflower and tree and bush and blade of grass to build a road to his home and then he went to jail ecological vandalism on an
TAX EXEMPT The chapel carries a donor’s name carved deep enough to outlive theology. So does the stadium, the laboratory, the business school where futures are priced in credit hours and compound interest. At orientation, freshmen are issued lanyards, passwords, a map that loops back to debt. The university expands like a body forgetting where pain begins: roots descending from branches,
APOCALYPSE NOW Ooh war, I despise 'Cause it means destruction of innocent lives War means tears, to thousands of mother's eyes When their sons go off to fight and lose their lives –lyrics to the song "War" by Edwin Starr Morning headlines announce anti-war icon, Country Joe McDonald has died. We remember his name from Vietnam, Woodstock, the Fish cheer, Veterans for Peace. As our
LUNCH Sorry to learn that your cat disappeared. It is always best to keep felines and other pets safe inside. Because there are majestic Red-tail hawks circling above who don't distinguish between fur-covered prey. They just snatch another tasty meal; their nature and hunger absolving their crime. F.I.'s YouTube reading of "Lunch" F.I. confesses: "'Lunch' was inspired by missing pet
RUDY GIULIANI MUTTERS DURING HIS LAST RITES If I could get building-big like I did for that Time Man of the Year cover, I could finally get a look at Lady Liberty’s underpants. That’s the one problem being an inside man. No more time to grope underneath. I’m not finished yet. I just want to stay around and do one last act, something only I can do to changes lives forever. Good bad, does that
