from things to ban

                           for Joseph F. Glidden

by Roy Duffield

there’s no-one around

for hundreds of miles

but a spine and its ribs

hang

the wire that cuts divisive

the land—the next half-

swaddled in its former skin stiffened,

ripped away at

the edges—

the tatteredalbicelestewaving to no-one

never left

to rest in peace

by the Patagonia winds—the next

still has its eyes big beautiful

and dead—the next—

the next—every few yards

the next—until the one that still struggles

the one that could still be saved.

But living is the only state

never hang-

ing here on display (and besides

there’s no-one around

for hundreds of miles). What

were they thinking

as they lost their last blood

to the desert shrubs

to the barbs

that protect

the absent owners’

land? There’s no-one around

for hundreds of miles