Absolute Negativity
Against the sun, there nothing but glare the critical
essay writes itself blind spots the politics of young
alienated boys cheerleading an every day atrocity
who has gone into exile whose broken the syntax into
clipped statements the cries of monkeys in their infancy
I remember blossoms in the street corner I remember blood
on the pavement near Hemlock Street I set my copy of Rimbaud
to the fire the alienated boys are trust-fund kids with bowie knifes
I come to them as the end of history I come to see the edge of a lake
Shuttering like tiny, wingless birds the violence of assertion
we break apart the day like oracle bones like faces
one whispers in Samaritan Aramaic the Mount Gerizim
runs with blood in the shadow of Justa twenty dead in New York
a hermit crab loses its shell low velocity
I live in this room the boys dig graves probably their own
It is Christmas soon the explosions come and go
I burned a cherry blossom tree I sprayed away the blood
C Derick Varn is a poet, teacher, and theorist. He currently edits for Former People. He has an MFA in Poetry from Georgia College and State University where he served as assistant editor for Arts and Letters: A Journal of Contemporary Arts. He won the Frankeye Davis Mayes/Academy of American Poets Prize in 2003 and his poetry has appeared in Unlikely Stories 2.0, Full of Crows, Writing Disorder, JMWW, Clutching at Straws, Xenith, Piriene’s Fountain, and elsewhere. He currently abides in Cairo, Egypt with his partner, and a bunch of books, reads manuscripts for Zero books, and writes at night.