Casseroles

We didn't want to grow into the shape of things to come.
The outflow of a borough’s artery
diverted through bedroom transoms,
cholesterol levels intolerable.
Cafés and brasseries frequented out of habit,
entryways buffeted by credulous debutantes,
inflamed throats clogged with beige stucco.
Emancipated by elegizing what hadn't
happened to us yet, the Printemps érable
aged us worse than cookbook photography.
Falling into Marx, the idea of Marx,
an intimation of Marx suggested by
greasy pint glasses and novelty riot gear.
We projected onto the political that which
we found intolerable in ourselves, thus
invalidating our radical struggle.
Imbibed and flirting, sharpshooting the shit,
we wielded astrologists’ platitudes so our
apocalypse could exist in a universe of meaning.
It was a threshold mistaken for a footrest,
a trail of gooseflesh leading to a canker in
the desert, and our babies were never born.
We feared the look on their faces as the shape of things to come.