A poem-a-day protest against the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House
Denver Butson
Question or Prayer
(for the masters and servants of war and for those who look away)
in the afterlife
if there is an afterlife
what will you tell
those who came
before you
about how you behaved
in the room
they prepared for you
the room
they swept and scrubbed
and freshened
for you
to walk into
to sleep and love in
what will you tell them
you did
with the book
of regrets
they left for you
in this room
to read
to memorize
to not repeat
to not repeat
what they had done
to others
or what others
had done to them
when this room
was their room
as briefly
as it is your room
to live in
to sleep in
to love in
will you tell them
you heeded
their request
their plea
their prayer
for you to leave the room
cleaner than you found it
to make
the book of regrets
thinner and lighter
than they left it for you
And how will you
look them in the eye
and explain yourself
those whose suffering
begged you
not to make
others suffer the same
how will you justify
what you have done
what you are doing
to others
or what you have
asked others
what you are asking others
to do to others
or what you have
turned your eyes away from
others doing to others
what you are turning your eyes away from
and allowing others
to do to others
while this ancient room
is your room
how will you ask
their forgiveness
those who prepared
this room for you
their forgiveness
for what
they and others
cannot possibly
forgive you for
in this
or any other room
in this
or any other
afterlife
if there is an afterlife?
Denver Butson is the author of The Scarecrow Alibis (Cloudbank Books, 2022), the sum of uncountable things (Deadly Chaps Press, 2015), illegible address (Luquer Street Press, 2004), Mechanical Birds (St. Andrews Press, 2001), and triptych (The Commoner Press, 1999). In 2020 he received the William Matthews Poetry Prize from Asheville Poetry Review, judged by Ilya Kaminsky. He lives with his wife and daughter in Brooklyn, New York.
Indolent Books and editor Michael Broder are back with another poem-a-day series as a creative response to the threat posed to our democracy by the current occupant of the White House. The plan is to continue for all 1460 days of the 47th American presidency.
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