TRIVIAL FIGHTS ~

______________________________________________________________________

And Trump said the time for “trivial 

fights is behind us.” He just didn’t say

which trivial fights he meant.

Protecting the rights of gay, lesbian 

and transgender people? 

Safeguarding voting rights? 

Investigating whether members of the

Trump team had colluded with the 

Russians to influence the 2016 

presidential election? Or maybe

finally getting him to release his tax 

returns, as every other modern

president has done?

_________________________

A N D R E W     R O S E N T H A L 

March 1, 2017 (New York Times, excerpt)

                    Donald Trump, Master of Low Expectations

GUY BIRCHARD~

Hecatomb Sixteen




Monarchs in hatbands:


Defeat deep in one's captured eyes.


Insouciance in the other's sweet.


Sitting Bull sees back forever, 1881,
downriver, liberty bad arrested,
last rifle surrendered,
earthly beauty and symbol of a
Monarch butterfly pinched from the air,
tucked for emblem, for camera, in hatband.


Old Walt, celebrated signifier at large, 'bout
same date, photographer's fool-de-rol, props
one of cardboard on forefinger, points a-
way. We don't do defeat in this culture.
We may do a cardboard
Monarch for the camera . . .


Defeat defeats us. In Sitting Bull's memory
and mind he rides all day in one direction
at liberty in open country. Without


no pain.





Hecatomb nine


Shooting Crows Again:


Time was, we lived odd
seasons on the prairie. Then


we witnessed first basque flower break
sod, and the cranes' high gyre.


Now I'm a townie, aint seen
a crocus in years, no more than hear


the cranes' weird croak way up.
Wind burns the snow and the snow


decomposes, the land so dry no melt
runs off. Shallow sloughs for waterfowl.


The crows are a good sight, back. I could
stand to be a crow, to make their play


in flight, to gang up in raucous confab, but for
the diet . . .


Cousin magpie succumbs to the new
virus in the land. Rancher


says he don't miss 'em. "Bastards
peck fresh cattle brands." I


miss them. I turn fifty-five
this spring, storm stayed. No


excuses, lots less of the map to follow
than retrace, fiddle-footed as ever,


a man of no rank come to a place without merit.


______________

Guy Birchard
H E C A T O M B
Pressed Wafer | Brooklyn
2017