ON THE BATTLE AND THE RACE

by Rick Mullin

Do you not think an Angel rides in the Whirlwind 
and directs this Storm?—from a letter written to Thomas Jefferson by John Page, July 20, 1776,
quoted by George W. Bush in his first inaugural address, January 20, 2001.

How is the Angel in the Whirlwind fixed
for drumheads come November? Isn’t she
supposed to show us something bright betwixt
the mountain and the river? Pardon me,
but aren’t we all endowed with intuition
in our human state? The crystal liver
of the Angel in the Whirlwind waits
for a replacement on a frozen river-
bank in Pennsylvania. She hates
when she’s strung out in this position.
Once the Angel in the Whirlwind was
in charge and teleology in vogue.
But now, the latest polls get all the buzz.
The drummers and the general go rogue
and disavow the shock of recognition.


Rick Mullin's new poetry collection is Stignatz & the User of Vicenza.

THE KING OF CHICKEN STREET

by Rick Gray

Chicken Street, Kabul. Source: Streets of Afghanistan Project

Not yet fourteen, he swings on donated crutches like an old jazz hand
Brushing the bad news lightly to his orphaned platoon.  

Cute won’t work anymore, the foreigners are all leaving the war.                        
Our new mission is grabbing anything they abandon.

Slip thick blankets off their emptied beds, still warm with home dreams.
Seize their Pop-Tarts, some good glue, and those spittoons. I have ideas.

And the general’s long strategy desk we saw on that looted TV, he commands,
Smash it into firewood with your remaining little hands.

We’ll need the heat.  And the meat, he squints, lifting his right crutch and aiming
Its chicken-bloodied tip at a shadow taking cover underground.

The others understand.
Any rat alive, or close enough. 


Rick Gray has work currently appearing in Salamander and has an essay forthcoming in the book, Neither Here Nor There: An Anthology of Reverse Culture Shock. He served in the Peace Corps in Kenya and teaches in Kabul, Afghanistan.