poem: we were the world, at war

hello to the dead years

hello to the girls in yellow hats, kissing the library windows

and pretending

they are kissing husbands. hello to the young dead men

in trenches, pulsing with no heat,

maggots curling around

skullcaps and helmets and

dead dreams. hello to the girls standing at the train

platform, waiting for him to come back,

waiting to make the library kisses

real. hello to champagne at midnight,

to manhood as a banner,

as a war-cry, as midnight sex

with the glorious undead youth.