Finnegan Degnan
be humble//sit down.
where the sirens start to sting,
where the liquor tickles,
and pins and needles,
I’ve gone spent on cell division.
the west 4th stop is filled with kids,
standing for dead kids.
goodnight buzzes from a mob
in Washington square,
to peepholes
in Florida,
in Connecticut,
in Chicago,
like telephone
it metamorphoses into a heart blessed
a prayer sent,
and then inevitably a handout.
goodnight,
no matter what it carries with it
does not telephone itself
into a universal ban
of the thing that kills kids.
i don’t know if you’ve ever seen
a deer drop dead before,
but the eyes are the last to go.
I imagine the baby blue windows
of seventeen sons and daughters.
I imagine thirty four
baby blue,
hazel,
green,
brown,
black
windows;
I imagine that they are the last to go,
carrying justice on their backs
like a grave shift.
I’m not sure if you’ve ever seen
a kid drop dead
i’m not sure if you’ve ever seen
the funeral
i’m not sure if you’ve ever seen
the mother,
but there is no name for one
who buries their own child.
two musics perform an arms race
of louder and louder speakers,
even those preaching peace
automatically split,
and so i stand next to the one
where yesterday’s Pulitzer Prize Winner
spits truth
over sirens and
white-guilt and purgatory
and i nod my head
and listen as the other side
backs away, and the volume lowers.
be humble,
and sit down.
Finnegan Degnan is an 18 year old singer songwriter and a poet who lives in Sunset Park in Brooklyn, New York, with his aunt Melanie, his uncle Terence, and his cousin Lola. He spends most of his time maniacally writing music in his bedroom, and every once in a while, usually on a subway, a poem pops out.
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