A three-year-old kid shot and killed himself
With a loaded gun somebody left lying around
This fact has darkened the last four days
Some slightly older kids seized the occasion
Of the victory parade after a sporting event
To discharge firearms into the crowd
After months of relentless bombardment
A nation-state is preparing to invade
The last refuge of displaced persons
In their hundreds of thousands
This in retaliation for the heinous crime
Of a non-state actor
While a different nation-state crushes
Yet another nation-state under the claim
That the object of the aggression
Has always been a subject state
In the aggressor’s empire
And a provincial potentate
Has lined the riverbed that separates
His own country from another
With murderous lacerating weaponry
And the governor of Georgia where I live
Has traveled to Texas to show his support
For this homicidal puppet show
I used to think of stupidity
As a mitigating factor
But they ought to know better
And indeed they do