Our country wants us to forget
for a while. This is the way
countries move forward. When
these deaths become history,
the shoeless madman
and his drowning wife
will live on the island of someone’s
precise dream. One bird
provides for the couple. Perpetually
exhausted, she flies to the mainland
and back, carrying the blackest
fruit she can find. They will eat
nothing that is not bruised.
Our country want us to forget
how we should live when the past
stinks of mistakes. This is how
the bird explained it
to the drowning wife
and the shoeless madman.
They were the makers of boats
they pushed across the river
for their children to find.