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The Sky Above Laramie
Above that epicenter, Laramie,
the sky now retreats beyond---
and past, and outside of---their apathetic reach.
In their snuggly, smug beds, those sleepers
are satisfied that a nightmare rules
rather than excepts, because none of them
accepts the plethora of the expressions of love.
As they slumber in exhaustion from
the careful, but ardent, avoidance of thought,
a beautiful young man---
brutally, savagely battered and beaten
by uncouth thugs (those self-appointed
defensers of marriage and the Rightsers of this
Amer'can way of life in these here states;
homophobes who stole his shoes as souvenirs,
adding a cheap insult to their inhumane assault)---
suffers the slow ebb of his life from his broken body,
hung upon some convenient barbed wire;
his assailants blasphemous travesty
of Christ our Lord's redemptive crucifixion.
The stars, in silence aghast, cannot look away.
The slumberers in Laramie will not mind to look away.
In noisy, delapidated automobiles,
they will drive past that particular section of prairie
without a second thought or first regret.
Henceforth, the sky now retreats beyond----
and past, and outside of---their uncomprehending reach.
Starward
