I Like When

my husband sits beside me
on our glider.  We watch birds
and discuss the garden.  Today
the first red
sunflower opened. 

Just over the shed’s roof,
three clouds line up– 
a bold one asks us
about how we are
advancing our gay agenda. 

We shrug. 
We kiss. 

The bold cloud falls off
the roof, gets caught
on rose thorns, and hobbles
back to the sky,
ragged and wispy.  

.

National Don’t Say Gay Law

Say straight say heterosexual say
marriage is a man
and a woman make up
TV shows where a man
and a woman have a misunderstanding
but it all works out in the end say
Bible verses over and over and say
them loud you may not be able
to sleep but keep saying them
when you see
two men holding hands
it’s perfectly fine to kill them
God insists that you do in fact
chop up the bodies
and sell the pieces at Chick-fil-a yes
it’s true that closets can suffocate
but think how pretty they can be
with crayons and oatmeal cookies
stay in your closet stay in don’t
say gay we’re ready for you
if you say

.

Complicit

White silence = violence.
We stay indoors watching the news–
we don’t see that we’ve built a fence

to hide us from current events.
We’re scared that we have much to lose.
White silence = violence.

We say that racists make no sense,
paint flowers on bombs, hear no fuse.
We don’t see that we’ve built a fence

while poor people can’t pay their rents
or recent payment overdues.
White silence = violence.

While our Congress experiments
with poisoned vials of untruths,
we don’t see that we’ve built a fence

to soften risk, a white defense.
Our complicity can’t hide clues.
White silence = violence.
We don’t see that we’ve built a fence.

.

Another Dreary Fascist

An exhausting day—I plant
a red coneflower.  Mosquitoes
consider me their private
McDonalds.  Over a billion served. 

All I want is to come in,
shower, and watch
What’s My Line on You Tube. 
As I head for the door,
a candidate asks if he can
have a word with me.  Am I
angry about Woke politicians? 
Do I want a border wall? 
And am I boiling over drag
queens reading stories
to kids in libraries?  He sees

my wedding ring, assumes
that I’m straight, and asks
if he can count on my vote.  No,

I tell him, and he snarls off
into the arms of Jesus
who puts him in an armlock
and fills his mouth with hornets.

.

Kenneth Pobo (he/him) is the author of twenty-one chapbooks and nine full-length collections. Recent books include Bend of Quiet (Blue Light Press), Loplop in a Red City (Circling Rivers), Lilac And Sawdust (Meadowlark Press) and Gold Bracelet in a Cave: Aunt Stokesia (Ethel Press). His work has appeared in North Dakota Quarterly, Asheville Literary Review, Nimrod, Mudfish, Hawaii Review, and elsewhere.