from a laundromat parking lot outside of waterloo

John Sweet

six a.m. beneath pollock's sky beneath the powerlines and the rumors of crashing planes and between us we are only a small war are only a minor skirmish in the history of carnage and none of these houses will fall because of it and what you do in this pale grey light is worry about your sister and what i do is read and fifty miles west of here your mother's boyfriend sleeps the sleep of the just in less than a year your brother will be dead a charred body pulled from twisted metal like a dozen others I've known some misshapen version of the american dream in a world where grown men walk through locked doors with the fragile skull of the future clutched tight in their trembling hands and what happens next is always obvious is always the sheer murderous weight of power applied to a young girl's throat and what you can never lose when you close your eyes is his smile