“Edit out the Swans!”
low-moans the bass clarinet
too loud to move
the slider.

And down she went.

Edited.

“Too white,
I want more mood-
we have products to promote
without distraction,
edit out those Swans”

You knew didn’t you?
You made a bargain
back then.

And on she went,
like a fox chasing the coop
like bones crunching bone

“Pull down that moon
it spoils the view -
crop it and crop it,
cut it and paste it,
we must sell soon,
re-edit those Swans”

Edited.

Her overbearing pounce,
trampling motives -
scattered lost in flight,
the antonyms of you.
Hear this now;

“Let tweezers fall
forget your teaser’s call
do not regret this all.”

And tiny eyes mean tiny minds,
and tiny minds mean tiny lives,
and you don’t have to edit,
anymore.

He started life as a liar
pretending to know
pretending to be -
it was a game
and it was fun.
It was a shock
when he learned
people believed him,
and so, he began
to believe himself.

That was then.

Stabbed in the head and left for dead
the local paper said - that’s what I read -
a man without a bed, on and on he bled
and I am led to fear these roads we tread.

He was kicked in the gut - punch-drunk cut
no reason nothing but - just lowlife in a rut
like name-called sluts with doors tight shut -
we must ignore such brutish unkind strut.

But carved in the street and left for meat?
Where cold rats meet with no retreat,
this man you’d never greet, now stains on cold concrete,
and fear remains, beneath my feet.

He, was, sliced through his head
cleft and dead, Redtop newsprint screwed and fled -
DID YOU HEAR? what I just read?
This man without a bed, on and on, he bled
and I am led to dread these roads we tread.