explain yourself

henry 7. reneau, jr.

covered up in sadness
convincingly burning like a star:
a fearless poem
trying to explain how unexplainable the world is
a thousand and one words
voiced by orphaned war-child amputees pouting
ticking time-bomb
silent screams of deferred dream
slingshots and bottles and rocks cascading
onto armored tanks mowing
through battle-scarred tenements
to impose order and laws that must be obeyed
and firing squads polishing their bullets
dreading the rabble dressing
in Sunday-best revolution
a bomb that’s been left ticking there to long
resisting mandated order
within the chaos of pragmatic realities

a noble poem enshrined
within the gobble and gluttony of designated fear
the brutal events that took place there
are still not entirely known:
an officer accused of troop carnage
a matter of semantics that becomes
a fabrication that requires thinking
about how to explain this shit
a brilliant capture and dispersion of light:
a child’s mitten
trampled into a pool of mud
a purse discarded on a highway shoulder
an abandoned work boot with tied shoelaces
lying in a pool of blood
the perfect place to hide a deployment of wrath
a failure to communicate
facets
of everyday life that thwart euphemism:

a visionary poem
searching for explanation
trying to fill a begging [space] a vacuum
mass graves interlocking tendon nerve
and bone aggrieved by an unknown Other
those wayward sheep subject to prosecution
the UCD Mrak 51
like Harriet Tubman, et. al.
alarming comfort zone regimentation
into disarray that rings crystal clear
amidst the discordant chatter
of persistent deceit hypocrisy
and fathomless greed
a zig-zag rationalization
deflecting reason into self-interest
distort deny and deceive

a strident poem
convincingly burning like a star but
pretending to be something else:
we only did it
to bring them salvation through Jesus
to bring them freedom and democracy
we did it in the name of progress
to civilize them
to oust a foreign terrorist-sponsoring despot
to balance the state budget
we did it because we can