NVN Tuesday: INTO THE DARKNESS

by Karen Marker

AI-generated graphic by NightCafé for The New Verse News.

*

If this isn’t the end, I don’t know what is.
I didn’t always wake up feeling this weary, 
feeling the pain of the wound in my chest
like I held a dead child. Like someone 
had stolen my sword and the light
of the grail was gone. I used to sleep 
through the night, trusted the widening gyre 
was leading me out of the dark.
 
If this isn’t the end, I don’t know what is 
after he flat out said he’s sending the military 
into our cities because he’s sick of the mentally ill, 
addicted, disabled, veterans, the hungry, unhoused, 
that he’s sick of those who come in needing shelter, 
jobs, a better life, that he’s sick of protestors.
 
I didn’t always wake up this worried
that if the Department of War blows up ships 
in the Caribbean they say are carrying drugs,  
ignoring all laws, it won’t be long before 
they’re waging war on us to make the world safer 
for the billionaires, sending off the unwanted
to concentration camps in the desert.
 
If this isn’t the end, I don’t know what is 
after the government shut down goes on and on
while the thugs on the streets get paid
to carry out “the Lords’ work.”
 
If this isn’t the end, I don’t know what is
except a comet coming straight at the Earth 
and all of it exploding.

*

Karen Marker is an Oakland, CA. poet activist who has committed to writing a poem a day of protest and hope in response to current events. Her first poetry book Beneath the Blue Umbrella came out recently with Finishing Line Press and explores family mental illness, stigma and healing.