no one in the whole world can get their tongue straight

house full of
insects
dying

ladybugs hornets flies

huddled against windows
drinking cold sun

time passed
in the study
of epic failures
fallen republics

marxism
fascism
france and rome

books migrate
through “the home”
Melville in the bedroom
Olson on the stairs
spanish novels and
Wallis Budge
stacked on the sofa

Solzhenitsyn

general theme of
gullibility and aggression
general inability to sit still

grace to have
an old man’s
library like a fruit tree
and a fruit tree

large predators
pass casually
ambling about the day
stop to yawn and
sun themselves
move on in search of prey

smothered in minor arcana
I rarely hear the bullets
rarely feel the kickback
of the rifle