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"An Arrangement of Deck Chairs," a poem by Gregory Crosby

An Arrangement of Deck Chairs

 

Fear anew the heat of the sun; it burns

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the air like high noon in a prison yard. 

It’s after the war but before the peace

that the next world disappears into dream:

a failure of the imagination. 

People say  my great-grandchildrenas if

they exist. They don’t. Nothing exists but

this empty house that is never empty. 

What do we owe? A debt defaulted

before it’s even incurred,  aye... Oh! You?

A late romance, fields fallow, real estate.

We are about to suffer the sea-change. 

After the election, before the end,

the curse is lifted; the curse descends.

 

Gregory Crosby is a former Las Vegan; his latest collection is Walking Away From Explosions in Slow Motion