By now

so many poems

are needed

 

each a droplet

of dirt

in the river

the ocean

the fierce snow

 

the collapsed moral

that made us think

we could take the

 

earth when it was

not ours

for the taking

 

but for the giving

the breathing

that watershed of

gratitude when

 

musical notes

like piano, bass, and drums

sang the sky

before the worry

the waterfall of pain

 

from the suicides

the homeless

the ex-lovers

 

parched for love

and filled with longing

mournful and

 

reaching for the high notes

finding

the bottom note

 

the sudden stop

dead air

verbal explosion

 

in a water bath

of positive and negative

that end

 

in battery,

assault, Trump,

this violent

 

seizing and

apoplectic greed.