by Jan Steckel
Ghost cars with their lights still on,
radios blaring, windows shattered,
litter the streets. It's like the rapture,
drivers disappeared. Alex Pretti's
beautiful baritone talks about service,
sacrifice, freedom that isn't free.
He's reciting his own epitaph,
just doesn't know it yet.
Boy Scout, choir boy, runner, biker,
named his dog Joule after a unit of energy.
Someone needs to immortalize him
in a song, like Joe Hill. I'm tired
of snuff videos featuring our best
and brightest. Bone-weary
of tinpot dictators, bantam Nazis
in custom greatcoats. Alex was a lover
who was loved, cared for people,
made them laugh. Now he's meat.
The pathologist will crack his chest,
weigh his heart, find it lighter
than a feather. Joe Hill tells Joule,
"Hear that? He's coming."
All the ghost cars flash their lights
in time to the whistles and shots.
radios blaring, windows shattered,
litter the streets. It's like the rapture,
drivers disappeared. Alex Pretti's
beautiful baritone talks about service,
sacrifice, freedom that isn't free.
He's reciting his own epitaph,
just doesn't know it yet.
Boy Scout, choir boy, runner, biker,
named his dog Joule after a unit of energy.
Someone needs to immortalize him
in a song, like Joe Hill. I'm tired
of snuff videos featuring our best
and brightest. Bone-weary
of tinpot dictators, bantam Nazis
in custom greatcoats. Alex was a lover
who was loved, cared for people,
made them laugh. Now he's meat.
The pathologist will crack his chest,
weigh his heart, find it lighter
than a feather. Joe Hill tells Joule,
"Hear that? He's coming."
All the ghost cars flash their lights
in time to the whistles and shots.
Ghosts and Oceans, Jan Steckel's latest book, is a collection of short fiction. Her poetry book The Horizontal Poet won a Lambda Literary Award. Her books Like Flesh Covers Bone, Mixing Tracks, and The Underwater Hospital also won awards.
