Antiquity. Michael Homolka

oxygen

      slathers the air in

      suntan lotion

      The destitute teethe at fatigues of cadets

      launching themselves toward

      some more inward

      six day war

      While out of the backs of chariots

      emaciated lovers receive star

      after star after

      star

Second Goshen

      They’re really going

      to kill us all It bears repeating

      inferences trickling

      in little by little like aphids

      I would have to have known history

      not been so close to it

      I couldn’t make sense of it

      where unmatched scrubs

      lie draped across the barracks

      bunks like forest markers

      fate meanwhile continuing

      its innocuous silence

      They can murder us each

      only once It bears repeating

      so many believing till the last

      moment we’d be spared

      Praise God O

      Praise God you can hear

      spoken again and again

      from the hedges and viburnum

Third Goshen

      Bright orange koi

      in ponds ringing paradise

      The Aryan gentleman

      promises me things

      Wearing a tulip

      behind his ear

      wagging his petit

      black-and-white

      buttocks Betty Boop

      style regales me

      with such as islands

      for tumbling

      thickets for splaying

      barrels and waterfalls

      for starting afresh

      all the richness

      of life’s vicissitudes

      I take his glosses

      at face value convinced

      he just wants

      the best for me

      and my family

      who gave their

      oils and corals

      moss manna and soil alike

      up for the future

      But he falls instead

      to swimming with

      bright orange koi

      by ivy-latticed

      lawns of the homeland

      weaving his Goldilocks

      curls with mint

      swaying suggestively

      in a light sarong

      Simple to see

      the creatures in whom

      he meant to inspire

      kinship only

      swim on unmoved

      I love the koi

      I thought I loved

      him but no

      to the koi and koi

      alone I feel loyal

      Their loose glow

      captures the closeness

      the family once felt

      stories till late

      each of us cast

      as saviors draped

      in loofahs and

      minks O Clark

      Gable O Pavlova

      They see me

      waking with aught

      but cinders for a heart

      as our Aryan lovely

      assures he can save

      us but flays my mother