Detonations

by Maureen Daniels

 

Endless summer and we were still

troops fighting for something

 

we weren’t sure we believed.

Aaron’s heart

 

swung open like an angry fist,

gushing and raw. It was that

 

animal that pulsed inside

each of us that made me

 

want to thrust my life

into the sandy ditch to mark

 

where his body had come undone.

Fusion of fire and storm.

 

I want to go home, lift

my bare knuckled boots

 

onto the un-magazined table

and hold the remote with a lack-

 

luster paw, watch any

other world come undone.

 

 

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Maureen Daniels teaches English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, where she is also a doctoral fellow in creative writing. She is an editorial assistant for Prairie Schooner and Western American Literature. Her work has recently been published in Sinister Wisdom, Wilde Magazine, Gertrude Press, Third Wednesday and the South Florida Poetry Review.