Heather McHugh



Iquity



It too has a den.
Even the literate

watch TV. Is honi
(as in soit) in-

dicative? Whose
old bête noir is fear

averts his look from like-
lihood: she cannot cuddle the big

bad night away. The Buddha is
a giggle-meister. Dr. Factoid sells

more fish oil: Fewer suicides in
Matsushima. Action, faction:

subtlety be sacked. Just get along:
unhappy endings outlawed by

a scientific vote: there's no necessity
for misery. (A lie.) In cinepop a little extra

nookie on the side; in cinemom your one and only
hubbie hurries home. Hi, hon. (Your honor,

honest, is not implicated. Soothers are not born to utter
terrifying truth.) And mercy knows

what men have done—so everywhere the one
and only split. They quit. The universal

donor is a goner.



© 2003 Electronic Poetry Review