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POETRY

Quiet Now

Stop talking, kiddo
It’s schedules and complaints and
attempts to spin the unknown into cotton candy that’s delicious and sweet and actually healthy

What can your mouth do
about shit teenage behavior
that ass in the White House
the friend with the big C

The decisions we agonize over
don’t require agony
and nobody hears our prayers

There is small flashlight in your hand — the English call it a torch — quaint
and you can point it where you want to go
and then walk in the dark following

And gently close your mouth
as one would stifle a laugh at a funeral

See and hear everything gorgeous and musical about your life

From the last of the potato chips to the first snowfall, this is all you’ll ever have