The National Guard is conducting live fire training five miles away, rattling our windows, frightening the dog, startling my jittery shell-shocked soul, driving home the point. My 11 year old draws a grenade, explains to me how it works, which is easier to survive, grenade in water or grenade on land. She learned this on YouTube from some scientists performing safety experiments. This experimental empathy, this walk in the shoes of another, this drawing breath while a sister sighs her last, baby in her womb sighing, too, This longing for peace, it combines and shreds to shrapnel the way things were, stripping them back, revealing what has been before and before and before. My slippered feet are comfortable in shearling while yours are sore from walking, running fighting, waiting for the other shoe to drop. I cannot comprehend this. In the morning I return to my poem, am interrupted by a clogged shower drain and the sound of rehearsing helicopters overhead.
3/15/22