The Dystopian Imaginary
Howie Good

The texts say commit utopia,
take the absent next step,

but the moon-faced babies
drowned in tubs by their mothers

were already there when I got there,
and still there when I left,

wearily wheeling an ash barrel
into the ghostly precincts of dawn,

a stranger's name flowing in loops
of soiled thread just above my heart.

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