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Wednesday, June 25, 2014

DARK DAYS

by Brian Beatty





A barking stray

trying to bite the whirling wind

 

gusts that blow loose 

front pages 

 

out of those locked

newspaper machines they rattle open 

across the street  

 

then paste up

against the locked windows and doors

of our locked house

 

like so many rain-soaked shutters

made from the world’s

cruel jokes

 

the latest black-and-white bad news

we would rather ignore

right there

 

in our faces 

demanding we must pay  

for what we’ve seen 

 

— that dog 

with its hot breath


likewise tells us 

more about ourselves 

than any of us knew before.



Brian Beatty's jokes, poems and stories have appeared in numerous print and digital publications.