Shine
Smoke and sky spiders fill the air
as missiles smash into Gaza
and powerful men drive needles
into the flesh of young girls.
Turns out Chomsky partied with Epstein,
so now I have to take up vaping
and go fill a shoebox with polaroid photos
of dead birds in car parks.
I’ll pretend I’m doing it ironically
so no one mocks my prayer cards
for a dying world.
Sometimes the Buddha looks like the Buddha.
Sometimes he looks like bleached coral reefs,
or rapefinger plutocrats with pointy teeth.
Sometimes he looks like a woman in her early fifties
sobbing snot-nosed and red-faced
at the cruelty of it all
in pajama bottoms
and a Pink Floyd t-shirt.
The war drums are getting louder,
and the bank boys are getting horny again,
and the flesh of the innocent is so soft
and so easy to digest,
and the darkness hides so much,
and the light makes so little difference.
But we shine it anyway.
We shine it anyway.
________________
The best way to make sure you see everything I write is to get on my free mailing list. My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece here are some options where you can toss some money into my tip jar if you want to. Click here for links for my social media, books, merch, and audio/video versions of each article. All my work is free to bootleg and use in any way, shape or form; republish it, translate it, use it on merchandise; whatever you want. All works co-authored with my husband Tim Foley.
Bitcoin donations: 1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2
Feature photo by Caitlin Johnstone (public domain).



Shine on you crazy truthtelling diamond. Thank you Caitlin.
Amazing imagery in a skinny word count. One of your best. "rapefinger plutocrats with pointy teeth" indeed! The world currently seems awash in them. To our collective dismay.