[ Louisville, Kentucky ]

Once a poet looked to me and said,
  I wish my mother had died, so that I would have something to write about.
and I have never been able to turn from it.

Once a city said,
  How do we operationalize compassion? before firing 20 bullets into a couple's bed
and never should the masses be able to turn from it.

Each day the tongue grows taller, and now it's almost reached the mouth's roof.
Each day the crowds gather louder, now nearly shaking the first coat of paint off the 2nd St Bridge.

Some days I think about that poet's mother.
I wonder if there is a hum in the gutter that grows to a scream
each time she wishes her daughter a good night's rest.

I imagine all the business meetings scheduled to redraw the city maps,
all the suits smiling slightly as they ask each other which part to cut in two,
how they plot the scalpel mathematically and call this renaissance.

This is what a city means,
because the official statement reads [ the city is growing more silent, safer ]
when really it means [ we are casting a mass grave, slowly ]

just like the child poet who likely once told her mother,
[ I'm no good at writing ] when really she meant
[ sometimes I dream of cutting your throat through ].