Prix Fixe

Francis Bacon, Figure with Meat (1954)

"Little man, what now?"—Hans Fallada

My name is Legion,

and I’ll be serving you tonight.

I recommend the genocide

today, along with the main delight.

Take your time if in any doubt

about the proper moral reason.

Yes, despair is on the menu.

Unfortunately, it's not in season.

Want an entŕée a bit more cuisinée?

Ethnic cleansing clears the palate

in its inimitable way

Many of our customers concur—

it has, they say, it's own allure

And lives to kill another day!

Sunday, December 7, 2025

In Brief

A painting by the chimpanzee artist Congo (1954–64)

Hoax

The sun sinks. It's all a hoax they say.

See the snow on the sidewalk?

Not there to stay. Gone tomorrow, here today!

This is not the world I was born into.

That's long departed. My parents, too,

Who never dreamt of this.

Draw a line under my writing.

What’s the earthly use of fighting?

Gratitude

In Plumstead waiting for a ride

To take us to the airport,

We met a man from the DRC

What was he doing there

So far, like me, from home?

He wanted us to solve some problem

But couldn't say what it was.

I gave him a few rand. Not a lot.

He watched ungrateful as we sped away.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo

They’ve been fighting there practically all my life.

No, not in the early years before Lumumba was murdered.

Back in the sixties my friend George Clay, a journalist reporting for NBC,

Was killed there by friendly fire,

Shot by a UN jawan.

And it still goes on—neither democratic, republican, nor even Congolese.

In life there’s no completion to human fate.

Standing at that door, I wait.

Jawan = soldier (Hindi, from Urdu javān young man)

Monday, December 8, 2025

The Spirit of the Staircase

“what you have to do as a writer: write day in and day out no matter what happens”

—William Stafford

Telling the truth as I saw it,

I became persona non grata:

The world's enormous certainties

Had no desire for those verities,

Threatening their insipidities.

Hence for forty wilderness years,

I threshed out learnèd others' words,

Winnowing clunkiness for pay.

I'd have it, the staircase spirit

Claims, no fondly celebrated way.

Obscurity in light of day

Is the best refuge from the fate

World loves to dish out to the great,

Rending its darlings in full flight.

Despite what happens, thus, I write.

It helps me pass the time of night.

Epigraph source: William Stafford interviewed by William Young, Paris Review 35 (Winter 1993).

Friday, December 5, 2025