Things incandesce. Glow with heat,
break into flame
as a water glass sitting on the edge
of a sunny table will alight
and you’ll find this small burning thing
wanting—
wanting — as prayer, as silence of the answer.
So the doubleness of things, of words.
What does civil mean now
its cudgled emptiness
breakdown in definition
enough to incandesce
in brother war
civil disobedience
loses its pact of politeness.
If it’s civil to leave newborns in a drop box
why not drop at her house –
one, ten, a hundred?
Let the possessed with bionic eyes
remain apart, on a sun-struck table
to burn themselves out.