American
space age hungry mouths
napalm marrow spinal column
hydrogen lipped
petroleum mouthed
three hundred million hands on the moon
three hundred million hands choking at one billion unborn
three hundred million burning in the heat of their breath

maybe we bless the humanity of mankind with a million years of choke
maybe prayer to dead presidents will create some new American paradise
maybe who needs human?
maybe we find solace in our addiction to the bomb
maybe we are born the children of some cruel manifest destiny

violence and porn and abortion of american minds
and the bastards of everyday events or
sons and daughters of some attrition of humanity

Nina Simone
I’m pulling at your voice
from the tongues and fingers
of the ash and asphalt people of this ash and asphalt place

because tomorrow all their children will be born with a hard curling autism in their small quiet heads
because tomorrow wealth will be measured in water you can drink
because tomorrow they will still lie and kill for themselves and lie and kill themselves

am i god or flatworm like slick and whorled and quiet
am i American baby doll story in American chain-link gutted town
am i anemone mouthed old ladies
am i anemone mouthed pale boys

this pearly
dead baby
American magazine face
is cracking me open like animal after bone marrow

this fat
grub worm
suitandtie
is eating me up with such awful delight

this curled
this purling
this rough skinned
this dead
this burnt eyed
this old dirt road
this cut out your tongue
this engine hearted
god handed men and women and worthless
are leering
and burning
and ripping

and I

hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate
hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate
hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate hate

static money eyed suburbanite
wet wormed flesh
losing your static money eyed religion,
if this is greed
this long tongued

concrete son all fallow skinned hardskin
love to be bought
and made
love to be gun
oil slicked
moneytaste
tongue on your skin

i will not be your dutiful son i will not live and watch while you kill people with my name i will not lay in your asphalt and motor oil womb i will not be afraid for you i will not gorge on my flesh and my blood and pretend that it is sustenance i will not fall away i will not make myself dumb for you i will not buy with the money you make selling guns to people to sell guns to people to sell guns to people to kill people i will not cower under the hand and voice of your marrionette god

these are the names of companies that are profiting from this war
KellogbrownandrootHalliburtonBechtelParsonsLouisbergerHealthnet
these are the people that make money sending your sons and daughters and husbands and wives and aunts and uncles and mothers and fathers away to die or kill or come home all fucked with a war in their head and ghosts of little girls with their legs blown off
FluorLockheedmartinNorthropBlackwaterExxonmobileBritishpetroleum
these are the names of acolytes of arson of rape of apathy of greed of grave robbing of ego of murder of wealth at the cost of humanity
ShellChevrontexacoDyncorpMilitaryprofessionalresources
these are the names of people whose god exists only in things
SchlumbergerConocophilipsBoeingRaytheonGeneraldynamicsTextron
these are the men and women holding the guns of a generation and writing these 100,000 civilians dead in their homes or pregnant woman hanging out the wreckage of her car or 2,450 funerals on the soil of this great nation or some kid just off a plane with the black stain of a useless gun in his arms in ledgers with columns marked opportunity cost or operating cost and then go home to have dinner with their wives or husbands and maybe smile across the table or not or going to bed and just not caring whose bodies their wealth and reputations are built on