by Devon Balwit
Believe in something even if it means sacrificing
everything. We read the words, and that part of us
suckled on tales of heroes rallies as behind a pennant
on the battlefield or before splintering city gates
—and yet
we are reading ad copy, a sly way to light a match
beneath our purchasing power. Fight the machine,
we’re prompted by the machine itself, so vast
as to be almost invisible.
—a galaxy
of nodes. This time, proceeds go to charity,
yet still we wouldn’t trade places with a worker
in this corporation’s factories, live off their wage,
raise children by their dumps. How deep does good go?
—How deep
is deep enough? Better than nothing,
some insist. With eyes keen enough to see
such a fraction, we must trace the whole web,
alert to its snag, the hypnotic vibration as the spider
—approaches
Devon Balwit has six chapbooks and three collections out in the world. Her individual poems can be found here or are forthcoming in journals such as The Cincinnati Review, apt, Posit, Cultural Weekly, Triggerfish, Fifth Wednesday, The Free State Review, Rattle, Poets Reading the News, etc.