War payment avoidance

I felt a twag of guilt as I wrote off my expenses of being a poet. Then I thought of the money wasted on war. Poets Against the War are on the protest side, our losses are for the benefit of all those sane folks who are afraid to refuse to pay. When I thought of the mothers grieving their dead children, I knew I was right, this way the war mongers have to pay more than an equal share.

Losses filed on Schedule C

“Sell your soul for bread,
Is that what the president said?”
Did he mean poetry, prose, or
Doughboy parody,
No one really ever pays for?
Tell the IRS, “Go away.”

My losses are deposits
In society’s sanity closets
Where mothers cry
Turn their hearts inside out
Repeat the thoughts, why, why?
My words: their only shout.




9 Lines to Remembrance

Paid with suspended reality
Stolen from children dancing aimlessly to the beat of history
The confused soldiers
Fling themselves into battle
Testing guardian angels with the faith of lovers
Believing all the while
Cheating death an opportunity
To share immortality temporarily
With names upon a stone