Aubade in 21st Century America
Last night, walking for chocolate-studded
ice cream, we talked about gratitude—
slippery son-of-a-gun—and the mansion—
unwalled—you and I hold in common.
I woke to a text checking if
the four of us are far enough
from a man who shot three machine guns
at many people in multiple towns.
I wrote funs at first—imagine that:
all these white men, desperate, desperate
for eyes ears hands, breathing inside
a role as prophet, avenger, god
instead reload and fire fun over
corner stores and crowds of strangers.
We are far and grateful; we listen into
the grates in us that wind moves through.
Gibson Fay-LeBlanc’s first collection of poems, Death of a Ventriloquist, won the Vassar Miller Prize, and his second, Deke Dangle Dive, was published by CavanKerry in 2021. His poems have appeared in the New Republic, Tin House, Narrative Magazine, and Orion, and he currently serves as Executive Director of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance.