Mass Puddles

The obfuscated truth of the media
a veil of darkness
the black veil of mothers
grieving their children
reduced to black letters on cold stones
black clouds looming
over a nation in mourning
the veil of mass media
of mass hatred
covering mass shootings
mass projectile excuses
mass constitutional extermination
from the public’s gaze
from a veil of mass yellow tape that
segregates and edits out
mass puddles in the streets
where beauty in all its blackness
once shone brighter than any false
gold star of protection
grieve no more, mothers,
put down your funerary fans
a black flicker remains
its incendiary rise will burn
the veil of darkness
no more

By Joseph Ellison Brockway

Biography:

Joseph Ellison Brockway is a bilingual poet, translator, and educator. He currently teaches Spanish at Mountain View College in Dallas, TX while working on his Ph.D. in Studies of Literature and Translation at the University of Texas at Dallas. He is the current Managing Editor for Reunion: The Dallas Review, and his poems have appeared in Zouch Magazine and Maudlin House.