THESE CAPRICES

The lucid explanation for the sudden explosion
the rational rationale for the abrupt dismemberment
the exhaustive justification for the leveling and disintegration of
that one sacred spot over there or that
one nonchalant human being over here
minding its own business until rudely interrupted by a
tyrant’s obsession whose business engulfs everyone else’s with
utter disregard and perfect aplomb

Shawl jacket shoes ankle bones eyeglasses hearing aid
favorite pen pocketbook full of photographs wallet full of
dust and a few wrinkled hard-won bills with
safeguards against counterfeit
blown into a million forgettable pieces more
impossible to reassemble than the
Dead Sea Scrolls and now a
million times more indecipherable

These are war horrors way beyond these
feeble expressions of horror even
Goya never imagined with his Caprices

Utterance itself goes numb at the horror of these
caprices

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