by Barbara Schweitzer
The headline read throngs for
these six men, mere boys with
six fists for faces
glowering in ecstasy,
guns raised for paparazzi,
shadows erased by a fire-ravaged flag.
Every group has its hoodlums,
every tribe its publicists,
its misanthropes, its psychopaths.
Each age has its Zeitgeist,
the Crusades, Fauvists, anarchists,
their relishes flavoring the hordes.
And here is ours:
information flowing
like rivers unleashed
from their shelves of ice,
drowning us in images, worded as if
by impressionists or ad execs.
Barbara Schweitzer is a poet and playwright living in northern RI. Her work has won numerous prizes including a merit fellowship from RI's NEA allotment. Her first volume of poetry, 33 1/3 (Little Pear Press) will be released in spring 2006.