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Ira Desmond Mar 2018
A trumpet muted—
an indigo umbrella
of the spring storms' hail.
Ira Desmond Feb 2018
The goat didn’t understand
the significance of the bell around

his neck,
smelled

the sunlight hitting
the dewy grass

as he opened his eyes each morning,
looked

at his handlers, the humans,
and thought of them

as his protectors,
took

a kinetic joy
in bounding through open fields

among sage and purple wildflowers,
kicking

up dirt,
and taking naps

in the shade of thick cypress trees
on hot, dry afternoons.

One day,
a rope was tied

around his neck,
and he was led

to a place he had never
been before, and

into a situation
he had never

considered
before.

The goat was tied
to a tree

in a sunken, gray,
muddy place.

He was surrounded by
a throng of faces.

He recognized
some of them—

humans he had known
and smelled,

sometimes kicked,
sometimes licked.

Some of the faces
smoked cigarettes

and sat in silence.
Others talked excitedly.

Others drank
and sang.

All of them were waiting
for something,

but the goat did not
understand what.

And then he
felt a hand

grab onto one of his
horns. Its grip was firmer

than the goat remembered
the grip of a human hand could be.

And then he felt an arm
around his back,

it was almost a hug,
but more resolute in its

intentionality—
wholly,

horrifyingly,
out of character

from what the goat had
understood about

his handlers.
The goat now

realized that
something was wrong.

He did not
want to be in this position

any longer. He
began struggling,

kicking more
and more violently,

but still he felt more arms
and hands

restraining him—
pinning him down

in spite of
his protestations.

The goat began to
cry out

for help, for God,
for one of his humans—

a final plea
to the universe

to come and rectify
the situation.

And then the goat felt
a cold, hard edge

pressed against his throat.
Wild-eyed,

he looked up,
and there he saw

his human,
the one who had

fed him
and cared for him

for as long as
he could remember.

The man ******
his arm

and yanked the goat’s head
back,

and the goat felt a shocking,
slicing pain.

He could sense that warm fluid was
draining

down his neck, could
tell something

irreparable had happened
to his body. His

eyes darted around,
looking at all of

the unflinching, cold faces
surrounding him.

Up until
this moment,

the goat hadn’t
considered

the possibility
that the ones whom he

loved
so dearly

and who loved
him

so dearly
could

betray him
like

this.
Ira Desmond Jan 2018
The Bear emerged
from the wildfire

a smoldering, wheezing ruin.
His paws had been

nearly completely seared off
by the superheated

forest floor
of the Sierra Nevada foothills.

His coat was singed and maimed
by ash and ember.

His eyes and nostrils burned
from the unsparing smoke he had breathed.

The Bear felt
the slightest pinch

behind his shoulder,
and his eyes grew heavy.

When he opened them again,
he was in a new place—

an incomprehensible place—
a place of straight lines

and unfathomable
mathematical precision and artificiality.

He had heard rumor
that such places existed—

the forest spoke of them
hurriedly but indirectly.

He had seen other bears return
with foreign things

inserted through their ears or ringing
their necks, inescapable and alien signifiers

of having encountered
an otherworldly form of existence.

The Bear had lost his strength and could
no longer walk. His paws were wrapped

in linen. He smelled fish skin
just beneath it.

Apes
came and went—just like

the ones he had
seen and smelled before in the woods.

But these apes were much quieter,
and less afraid.

They only visited when he was
half-asleep or having trouble breathing.

The Bear drifted in and out
of consciousness like this

until he lost track of day
and night and time.

After one long but fitful sleep
he came to.

He smelled the forest again
before he had even opened his eyes.

His paws were no longer wrapped,
although they still smelled of fish.

He braced his massive frame
against the warm, dry earth and pushed.

His strength had returned
at last.

Three of the apes were standing
just a short distance away.

The Bear did not fully understand
why they had intervened,

or why they abducted him as he was making
peace with his own death.

He thought that they could be divine.
But he decided to stay wary of them, as bears do.

The Bear walked back into the forest,
scorched but now healing.

He wondered who or what would intervene
to help the ones who had saved him,

wondered whether they, too,
have some incomprehensible celestial stewards

that wait to rescue them
as they themselves wheeze and smolder

and shamble, unknowingly,
toward death’s door.
Based off of a photo published in the New York times after the California wildfires of 2017.
Ira Desmond Jan 2018
I hope I die in summer

on a humid night
when the grass is yawning and stretching out
toward the moon,

and the frogs are croaking on
like a chorus of metronomes
as the last curls of life wisp away from my body,

a final reminder
that things and time
will continue beautifully,

harmoniously,

without me.
Ira Desmond Nov 2017
This Time-Lapse Video of
Disneyland Transforming for the
Holidays Is Truly Magical

The Deepest Fish Ever
Captured Is So Ugly I Want
to Throw It Back in the Sea

Sounds Like Ant-Man and
the Wasp May Have a Major
Impact on the Marvel Cinematic Universe

Watch Amputee Monkeys Control
Robotic Arms by
Changing Brains

The White House's Christmas
Decor Looks Straight Out
of a Horror Film

An Asteroid Will Pass
Near Earth Next Month But
No, You Don't Have to Worry

Hold Up, the New
Jumanji Movie Is
Actually... Good?

Over 75,000 Evacuated in
Bali as Mount Agung Spews
Gigantic Clouds of Ash

Your Dark Side Shrine Needs
This Burnt Darth
Vader Helmet Replica

The End Credits
Scene of Justice League Has
Been Bugging Me
Ira Desmond Nov 2017
As the day
slumps on

and the afternoon
sun

is at last
harpooned

and reeled
toward

the horizon,
I,

sitting in my cubicle,
feel

my neck begin
to

list windward,
like

a sinking
sailboat,

its sheets
torn,

naked mast
shuddering,

its heedless final heading
being

that white fog
bank

that rolls over
the

coastal range
to

my west out
the

third floor
window.

The fog
cranes

its neck
ever

so slightly
upward

to meet my
gaze,

like a timid
dog

just pulled
awake

after a short, fitful
nap.
Ira Desmond Sep 2017
Words are like sharks’ teeth—
rows upon rows of them
sitting like pews in an empty cathedral—
the light playing through the stained-glass windows of the gill slits—
glinting through the busy, flitting motes
of plankton dust.

Words are like sharks’ teeth—
endlessly guarded,
but easily discarded,
flipping like coins in an Italian fountain—
sinking into the cerulean abyss
of the Adriatic Sea.

Words are like sharks’ teeth—
a fatal phalanx
oft dismembered,
seldom remembered
except as but an evolutionary assemblage—
a prehistoric assembly line.

O, but
words are like sharks’ teeth!

The edge takes,
the point drives home—
the carnal hunger of the gums
resonates throughout the jaw,
compelling the incisors
to test their power
against the defenseless tautness
of the prey’s flesh.

The eyes roll back,
the neck jerks.
The water fills with a crimson miasma—
a hemoglobin ecstasy—

a feeling of God
flowing through the machine.

Words are like sharks’ teeth.
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