Philip Kobylarz, What They Also Call “The City,” Photograph
Perseverance Lands on Mars
& conflagrations
candle the anthrax
that seeps into the streets
but in the heart
there is only violence
enough to retire in Miami.
A smile twists
across the boxes
that bulge out of trash cans
while a child’s old trophies
sunshine the clustered
window panes. Napalm
stagnates in a vast bathtub
& pantries exorcize maize
from the mouths
of dust storms. The laws
collapse like a ladder
on the sun-crazed laborers
& judges gavel the grounds
of a car park. Bind the branches
of cleaved willow trees
& binds will branch down
the cleaved willow trees–
_______________
Andrew Hanson