NINE/ELEVEN:20 — “There Is a Way Out”

There is a way out I can’t see, most can’t see,  

rising from the bottoms of the sands’ lowest points,  its roots and brambles, dripping leaves, my mother said 

The economy said no child left behind so I climbed a tree and  dug for sand  a terrorist in the sand  the balance 

—the difference between the two is that I only forgive 

OIL 

GOLD 

WOMEN 

which are natural resources: 

    the ghost stands 

    beauty at her side 

    pouring behind your curtains 

    urinating 

your father is now a tranny, your father as a man in his portrait hangs over the fire place, your father with an apple in his  mouth, your father in lipstick, your father the roasted pig 

there is a way out from Hell: 

everything that makes sense  So here is a fact: every president has been either a Democrat or a Republican as far as  I am concerned  There really are not, my mother said, any shades of gray   gray is Abu Ghraib  white hot &  fascist 

power is  a never-ending spiral  unraveling Lucifer’s magick   buzzing & Satanic  concrete bunker

To a coward God asks
Where are you?
Adam was not wrong in his shame.

— Hayden Church is the author of A Question of Refinement, a book of poems. His work appears in Azure Bell, The Florida English Journal, Encyclopedia.Zone, and an untitled book forthcoming. He has a website.