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There’s a clever thing, stabs at her hand on every corner now, revising the screed. Watch her huff at the tiny screens that send her chimpish copy up the line, to speed the raising of the giddy, pixelled hall: cornerless, mirror-tiled, the gorging sphere a fast-receding shell enclosing all we say or see, never to disappear, bigger with each second, and the next, its facets auto-replicant, until the Record of  what was— each fingered text and pic, the starry shards the hours distill — impounds what is, slaves us in its spell, sorting the diamonds in our dazzling cell.

Darkness spills across the sky like an oil plume. The moon reflects bleached coral. Tonight, let us praise the sacrificed. Praise the souls of  black boys, enslaved by supply chains, who carry bags of cacao under West African heat. “Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat,” sings a girl dressed as a Disney princess. Let us praise the souls of   brown girls who sew our clothes as fire unthreads sweatshops into smoke and ash. “Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good,” whisper kids disguised as ninjas. Tonight, let us praise the souls of Asian children who manufacture toys and tech until gravity sharpens their bodies enough to cut through suicide nets. “Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me,” shout boys camouflaged as soldiers. Let us praise the souls of  veterans who salute with their guns because only triggers will pull God into their ruined temples. “Trick or treat, smell my feet,” chant kids masquerading as cowboys and Indians. Tonight, let us praise the souls of native youth, whose eyes are open-pit uranium mines, veins are poisoned rivers, hearts are tar sands tailings ponds. “Trick or treat,” says a boy dressed as the sun. Let us praise El Niño, his growing pains, praise his mother, Ocean, who is dying in a warming bath among dead fish and refugee children. Let us praise our mothers of  asthma, mothers of  cancer clusters, mothers of miscarriage —pray for us— because our costumes won’t hide the true cost of our greed. Praise our mothers of  lost habitats, mothers of  fallout, mothers of extinction —pray for us— because even tomorrow will be haunted —leave them, leave us, leave—

We’re having a Halloween party at school. I’m dressed up like Dracula. Man, I look cool! I dyed my hair black, and I cut off my bangs. I’m wearing a cape and some fake plastic fangs. I put on some makeup to paint my face white, like creatures that only come out in the night. My fingernails, too, are all pointed and red. I look like I’m recently back from the dead. My mom drops me off, and I run into school and suddenly feel like the world’s biggest fool. The other kids stare like I’m some kind of freak— the Halloween party is not till next week.

Roy Halston Frowick, 1932–1990 He kept his middle name, the pick of   the lot, he thought, and mispronounced himself:Hall-stun. At Bergdorf’s he acquired an accent and referred to himself   in the third person, every bird he flayed wrapped in Ultrasuede. He lit a True with a True, smeared his hirsute muse with sequins. There were air- kisses, Capote’s new-cut face at Studio 54, that Baccarat flute of ejaculate. Never too late, he ordered in meat and potatoes, and a trick. He called it “dial-a-steak, dial-a-dick.” He appeared on The Love Boat, Halstonettes in tow, maybe the high, maybe the low, watermark. When his pupils betrayed him at work, on came the shades. And a well-cut blazer, paranoia. He had signed away the rights to his name, for options. When he tried to reclaim them from the conglomerate, he excused himself to the toilet, just a sec — white dust on a black turtleneck. His block started to look a lot like sickness. Even his beloved orchids, the sickness. Just like that, the eighties were gone. New York, New York, the eighties were no one.

Bulkeley, Hunt, Willard, Hosmer, Meriam, Flint, Possessed the land which rendered to their toil Hay, corn, roots, hemp, flax, apples, wool, and wood. Each of these landlords walked amidst his farm, Saying, “’Tis mine, my children’s and my name’s. How sweet the west wind sounds in my own trees! How graceful climb those shadows on my hill! I fancy these pure waters and the flags Know me, as does my dog: we sympathize; And, I affirm, my actions smack of the soil.” Where are these men? Asleep beneath their grounds: And strangers, fond as they, their furrows plough. Earth laughs in flowers, to see her boastful boys Earth-proud, proud of the earth which is not theirs; Who steer the plough, but cannot steer their feet Clear of the grave. They added ridge to valley, brook to pond, And sighed for all that bounded their domain; “This suits me for a pasture; that’s my park; We must have clay, lime, gravel, granite-ledge, And misty lowland, where to go for peat. The land is well,—lies fairly to the south. ’Tis good, when you have crossed the sea and back, To find the sitfast acres where you left them.” Ah! the hot owner sees not Death, who adds Him to his land, a lump of mould the more. Hear what the Earth say:— EARTH-SONG “Mine and yours; Mine, not yours. Earth endures; Stars abide— Shine down in the old sea; Old are the shores; But where are old men? I who have seen much, Such have I never seen. “The lawyer’s deed Ran sure, In tail, To them and to their heirs Who shall succeed, Without fail, Forevermore. “Here is the land, Shaggy with wood, With its old valley, Mound and flood. But the heritors?— Fled like the flood's foam. The lawyer and the laws, And the kingdom, Clean swept herefrom. “They called me theirs, Who so controlled me; Yet every one Wished to stay, and is gone, How am I theirs, If they cannot hold me, But I hold them?” When I heard the Earth-song I was no longer brave; My avarice cooled Like lust in the chill of the grave.

Every Wednesday when I went to the shared office before the class on the comma, etc., there was on the desk, among the notes from students aggrieved and belly-up and memos about lack of funding and the quixotic feasibility memos and labyrinthine parking memos and quizzes pecked by red ink and once orange peels, a claw hammer. There when I came and there when I left, it didn’t seem in anyone’s employ. There was no room left to hang anything. It already knew how to structure an argument. It already knew that it was all an illusion that everything hadn’t blown apart because of its proximity to oblivion, having so recently come from oblivion itself. Its epiphyses were already closed. It wasn’t my future that was about to break its wrist or my past that was god knows where. It looked used a number of times not entirely appropriately but its wing was clearly healed. Down the hall was someone with a glove instead of a right hand. A student came by looking for who? Hard to understand then hard to do. I didn’t think much of stealing it, having so many hammers at home. There when I came, there when I left. Ball peen, roofing, framing, sledge, one so small of probably only ornamental use. That was one of my gifts, finding hammers by sides of roads, in snow, inheriting, one given by a stranger for a jump in the rain. It cannot be refused, the hammer. You take the handle, test its balance then lift it over your head.

I have seen The old gods go And the new gods come. Day by day And year by year The idols fall And the idols rise. Today I worship the hammer.

in florida a giant hamster lays in bed worrying about its future the hamster has bad eyesight and many other problems later that night the hamster drives its car around listening to sad music; the master lightly drums its paws on the steering wheel the hamster is alone but not for long: at home three waffle friends wait cooling inside a countertop oven in the kitchen

in the evening the hamster sits at the computer watermelon juice and coffee sit by the computer the hamster drinks all of the coffee after a few minutes the hamster drinks all of the watermelon juice the hamster lays its paw atop a neatly folded to-do list; this is a resourceful hamster with a strong will, a sincere and loving hamster friend, and a confident nature we do not need to spend any more time or empathy on this hamster

The hand and foot that stir not, they shall find Sooner than all the rightful place to go; Now in their motion free as roving wind, Though first no snail more limited and slow; I mark them full of labor all the day, Each active motion made in perfect rest; They cannot from their path mistaken stray, Though ’tis not theirs, yet in it they are blest; The bird has not their hidden track found out, Nor cunning fox, though full of art he be; It is the way unseen, the certain route, Where ever bound, yet thou art ever free; The path of Him, whose perfect law of love Bids spheres and atoms in just order move.