Violence
by Gregory Djanikian

Sometimes it can't be avoided
even though you might decline
the invitation to step outside—
sometimes you are outside

maybe in the repose of your garden
among rose petal and fern, but the whole
unvarnished spectacle of do
before you're done unto unfolding
as spider devours beetle, beetle, aphid,
and the cat red in the tooth and claw.

No need to bring up bombs bursting
in synch or the rockets' red glare
or every laser fescue pointing out
all that's erasable, good-bye good-bye.

It's among school children now,
maybe even in your neighbor's house,
eating ravenously at his table,
agreeing with everything he says.

Inside, your daughter is locking
all the basement windows, your son
is drawing a truth machine to zap
the bad from the good, and when
your wife comes home to tell you
of a small injustice she's endured,
the arrow of your steely retribution
thwunks into a soft, imagined heart.

No one immune here, no one
merely a small flash in the pan:
everything hugely combustible.

In the garden, you're deadheading
lilies, the petals spiraling down
like crushed wings, and your fingers,
steeped in pulp, are turning yellow,
orange, incarnadine, damage
creating its own aesthetic,
painting itself on your skin.

And if anyone asked you now
you'd confess you're damage, too,
you're for wreckage of heart and bone
wrenching out the smallest penance.

Above you, purple bruising the edges
of the sky. Even the heavens.

In another moment, someone
might come looking for you,
touch you on the shoulder
and you'd flame up.

Nothing seems so improbable
as the world of a few minutes ago.

Here's the night full of stars.
Behind each one, the darkness
you can never see.