David Sapp
Rather Warm
Rather warm
I’m certain
You’d agree
We’ve fiddled around
For far too long
Now everyone
Watches Rome
Everything everywhere
Burning brightly
Needlessly thoroughly
And you and I
We are all Nero
Mindlessly plucking
Strumming humming
Catchy tunes
In our comfy air
Conditioned apocalypse
Tiny Windows
Down Smokey Road
Deep in the holler
Edge of the woods
A plain white house
At first glance
An ordinary dwelling
But with unusually
Tiny windows
Brandishes strident
Political preferences
From its porch
Flags and signage
Nailed to the siding
Adjacent to and
Noticeably larger than
Its small apertures
You must wonder with
Such narrow openings
It must be impossible
To catch a glimpse
Of heavens spinning
A plump saffron moon
Skirting the horizon
A fox slipping silently
Past barn and silo
Or when it first begins
To snow – you know
That white blurring of
Vision edge to edge
Or taking in the breadth
Of humanity living
Breathing and suffering
Just beyond
Those tiny windows
Despite Khrushchev
When we were two
October 1962
JFK on the TV
Moms and dads around us
Must have made love
Despite Khrushchev Castro
And missiles – in beds
Whispering and wondering
Designing elaborate bomb
Shelters in their heads
In our first year that
Sizzling upstairs apartment
We made love never
Getting enough of the other
On our mattress lugged
Into the front room for AC
We gaped at our tiny TV
A man despite his shopping
Bags stopping the tanks
Stopping the party
In Tiananmen Square
When the towers fell
NYC ash in our TV now
Annihilation not so distant
We went to work to school
And made love tenderly
Tended our kids despite
Daycare lawncare taxes
Mortgage utilities insurance –
No time for terrorists
Lurking beneath our bed
Eventual empty nesters
Ukraine and tanks again
Bombs blood despair
Just another despot
Still we fret over the TV
Wish we were young enough to
Join an International Brigade
Still safe in our bed
Whispering and wondering
We make love despite
Our aches and pains.
