Poems
by KJ Hannah Greenberg
Quondam Excellence
Sticky content, published intending to boomerang its patrons,
Akin to other written bits featuring horse-whispered pythons,
Perennial prickles of invented hedgehogs and avuncular cats,
Leaves no clue that regulated turkey meat cant get distributed
To Komodo dragons until a malamoodle or two are consumed.
New editions of toasters, dishwashers, furnaces, notwithstanding,
Its become increasingly urgent for clumsy or botched attempts
At acquiring sinecures, to be better rehearsed; most societies yet
Believe its an uncommon privilege to eat lots of press releases,
Complain in international forums, watch popcorn fairies dance.
After all, waste bins remain finite, frightful, ill-conceived beasts.
Homework assignments, mostly those arranged for broad daylight,
Still cause imbroglios, still curry partiality among squamous sorts.
See, requiring new data from nerds implies concealing big demons.
If only teacher rethought their fondness for deadline-related gaps,
Wed use our letups for lunar travel or for movie theatre vacations.
In the interim, theres no corrective to parents values, no substitutes
For kindred grownups tenets. Despite sundry oldsters appearances,
Forcing them to commit to cultural appreciations of feathers, to bind
With uncommon paragraphs of learning, chickweed, quells no hunger.
The ability to recite long dead lyrics isnt anodyne for self-reflection.
Threadbare hearts spit extant judicious ammunition while wrenching.
Somnolent Lounging on the Sofa
Were fixed, in our minds, that vulnerable parties require safety over comfort. Anyway,
Given the legalized abuse of children, women, and animals (via federal ambient noise,
Also by communities of readers glomming to bodice rippers and blood-tinged pages),
We will fail.
Hurts no question of class prejudice or racial injustice; rather, stepping on lives rounds
From: interest in protexia over justice, fame over character, plus fortune beyond civility.
Too few actions, nowadays, galvanize heroes, keep citizens from harm. Moreso, shared
Reality seems messed up.
The status quo, despite its caveat emptor exposition, suffers as a hotbed of vituperating
Publics. Taken together, we consume risky ideas, regulatory inspectors plus old engineers
Notwithstanding. Rare allochtoons yet believe honestys myth or invest in vitiated oaths;
Weve failed.
Accordingly, society perches some distance away from painful, physical interactions.
When a man and a woman commit to building a home together, Heaven hankers, but
Sighing stays missing in couples lacking thaumaturgy; currently, all magic is gone.
Realitys messed up.
Relations became confounded as proffered information about work, leisure, habits, values
Emerged perplexing. Ethnogenetics increasingly wrought to reify groups, establish ethics.
Whats more, faute de mieux, numerous tertiary schools feted intolerance for spiritual folks.
Wed failed.
On balance, because marital hazards are dissimilar, relationship got unjustly weighted.
When feeling cantankerous, or otherwise culling scripted outside morals, unswerving
Types took to somnolent lounging on the sofa, to respecting peculating ideas kill chaps.
Reality was messed up.
Precordial Thump
Horrible aggressions remain sufficiently uncomfortable to think round, endeavor
Toward, respond to (tolerating abuse is antithetical to all moral punctiliousness.)
Yet, neer will we rule the cosmos, or, inversely, restrain pernicious individuals.
Concurrently, inviting peers to interpret essential items for themselves is stupid,
As long as theyll allege that their constrained interpretations are appropriate.
Thus, others nonmindfulness botches pleasure of even hope borne by breathing.
All in all, some of us delay concerns about: rape, misogynous carnal encounters,
Gender prejudice at home or school, abortion, and single parenthoods mutilation
Of self-authority. Risky social myths abound around: stalking, domestic violence,
Exploitation, cruel animal husbandry, maltreatment of zoo animals, customary
Predation, harassment, elder harm, subjugated civil rights, enforced castes. In talk
Email, texts, wisdom apropos apartments, finals, taxes, utters nothing on evil.
Prejudice against differently able, mentally challenged, neuro diverse folks, child
Molestation, desertion, PTSD, the beholding of carers misuse, filicide, bullying,
Genocide, reversionist acts build paddocks for otherwise compos mentis mortals.
We forget that women are not vaginas, but complex entities; nurslings need
Not to grow in fear or develop broken self-esteem-they are precious; pets should
Not be thrown into cooking pots. Its our duty to guard, not exploit, all of nature.
The boreens between arteries and the hearts remote passages constantly stream
With red messengers, filling days and nights with corporeal bogies, plus tutelary
Rhythms. Yet, synchronized with rubrics for surge, those sectors spurt warnings.
Acting in a scholarly manner used to require hiding: dewars, nice hair, Bibles.
These days, substitute demographics, whose service vectors ebb from blossoms,
Elsewhere determine noxiousness per inventing and vending small manuscripts.
Its easier to integrate values via cat-like people or multi-legged monsters than
Comprehend basic truths of human faults. In excusing so many uncanny valleys,
Weve become the felons; weve grown contented with reprehensible veracities.
Its time to: yield sagacity found in contemporary junkies wishful judgments,
Transform our customs character, allow ourselves dissonances wretchedness.
We can be heroes contesting taxing certs, or cowards if we accomplish elsewise.
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