By Mark Neely

Featured Art: Ageless Darkness by John Sabraw

the newspaper tells
the childrns story
the mayors heart

swells and then explodes
near the end of the parade
I read Dickinsn

as flies flash drkly
against the blue wall
in spring my blood runs dank

I have these lttle spells
shout back at the news
cast pills

into my throat
sin my high school song
disappear into the moated

rooms the shooters eyes
sink forever in my memry
my kids hold signs first

grade fourth grade class
of twnty twnty too
class of those

who God held in the light
though we did nothing to deserv
though we didn’t believe in hem

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Mark Neely is the author of Beasts of the Hill, and Dirty Bomb, both from Oberlin College Press. His third book, Ticker, won the Idaho Prize for Poetry and was shortlisted for an Indiana Authors Award. He is a professor of English at Ball State University and a senior editor at River Teeth: a Journal of Nonfiction Narrative.