Tag Archives: AK-47

AS A CHILD

as a child, you
wrote poetry

a form of liberation, if
not the very weapon of it

something poetic
about that
    curved magazine

the brilliance of
its rugged simplicity
thing of
wood
   and metal

Garand and
Sturmgewehr, you

delivered us
    their love child

Tarantino’s Samuel L.
telling us
   in Jackie Brown
this is
   the perfect amalgam of
voice and
rhythm

absolutely essential
when you need
to clear
a whole room

and when you passed
word went out about
your deep
regrets at having
created this
sublime artifact of
deadly engineering

left us
   if not with a song then
your signature
                  tune, and

from your grave,
that distinctive sound marking
the death
of Empires, release from
burdens

and then the legend
    buried beneath that good
Russian earth

if they
   were to raise you, disinterr
you

chamber
   the first round

would
    you fire

from the beginning always
a poet of fire