Dark Enthusiasm

by cherbo geeplay Sometimes I swear I see the clouds closing in, always like a high tide boiling the ocean waves. Now I can't move my limbs and immobile tongue. I am speechless in a world with too much to say. I cannot stand the pain. Here I am, marveling at how a black man walks down the street and is shot in the back, a dummy for target practice. A mother’s tears soaked against her pillows, crying all night; red clouds crunching her shoulders under the weight of her pains, the sight of a truck at break-neck speed running into a crowd down the curb, because a bigot thinks hatred serves his world view of community. And in Charleston, blood in the pews, places of worships no longer safe havens, it is Trump’s country. Today the soft moans of our breath burn under the heat of misogyny. What goddamn dark enthusiasm is that? Copyright ©? In Parentheses Literary 2021