by Doris Henderson
We are sitting in a darkened room,
inert, like a drawing in charcoal.
A thief waits outside the window.
He swallows dreams, memories.
There is a bomb under the couch.
No one is trying to remove it.
We sip red wine, comment on
the inevitability of the explosion.
Then we stop talking about it altogether;
it becomes an impolite subject.
We play music, tell stories
to soothe our jangled nerves.
Today is the Official Celebration of Hope.
We wear bright colors,
pretend to love each other and the fate we share,
pretend safety, solidarity, high purpose
pretend we have time.
Doris Henderson's work has appeared in Sagewoman, Black River Review, Calliope, Comstock Review, Window on the World, prior issues of New Verse News, and other journals and anthologies. "Bomb" is about those things --- too numerous to mention --- currently "under the radar."