The Gleaners

Leave the grapes

on the vine

for longer than the rest

labor has been overrated

hunger says it best

workers are the construct

of fat ones strutting sated

from the farmhouse to the table

leave the wheat

in the fields

to be picked at by the birds

the ones who burn the
construct down
are those who tend the earth

ownership is rape

peace is compromised

leave the grapes

they’re yours and mine

the gleaners will be heard

Ms. Understood

She won’t turn on the fairy lights
tonight

bluish black is back

in spite

of sweet pretending

never ending flight

the weight she needs to fall asleep

is there in case of emergency

She was born in a retrograde

tonight

it is there again

the sleep

of homeless children

dreaming blanket fears

setting the house on fire one day

to fool the masters of cruelty

She hesitates to disinvite

tonight

they appear unarmed

prophets

Emily and Hank

argue through the night

the value of the spiked nose ring

to starve the keepers of slavery

She won’t turn on the fairy lights

tonight

a new fool proof plan

exists

faraway a voice

the middle of the sweetest dream

feral, fairy, just a thing

reminds her human is everything

For Claire Robsen