ate the whole town, county, state of Pennsylvania,
United States of Self-Absorption
then exploded
In red, white, and blue flames
shooting out of Everyman’s water tap.
In a democracy, we get the firewater we deserve.
* * * *
"Walleye Ate the Oilman" appears in Vigil for the Marcellus Shale, edited by Dwain Wilder and Bart White. John Roche teaches English at Rochester Institute of Technology. Three of his poetry collections, The Joe Poems (2012), Topicalities (2008) and On Conesus (2005), are available from Foothills Publishing, and Road Ghosts (2011, published by theenk Books, is available from SPDBooks.org. He has appeared in numerous magazines, including Yellow Medicine Review, House Organ, Big Bridge, and The Woodstock Journal. John is currently editing an anthology of poems about the mythic Joe the Poet for Beatlick Press, Albuquerque. |