DAVID JAMES BROCK (Toronto)

Study the universe and reveal the reason optimists
stopped searching, or S.T.U.A.R.T.R.O.S.S.

Yet we look for it with map and torch in every corner:

our search takes us to new beds, old bars. We look

under patriotic rocks and see pill bugs scavenging,

feeding on their own shit for the copper. So we go

underwater, to hot vents where the secrets mount, where

copepods thrive in impossible dark. We chase our big

kills. Endangered species. Meat. The brag of the hunt. 

It’s not a freedom we miss, but a loss of comfort

near our rarest carcasses. All joy is faux. No

Gods ever presided. We’re out of little guys to kick.

Don't say we didn't look. We whirled. Old logic

implied we'd get what we worked for. That was super

childish. We congregated, repeated We’ll be okay. We

kid ourselves with pep rallies. We leave each other 

wounded. It was gobbledygook that a common good

annuls specific evil. The fables are a typo. Rocks reject us.

Deep, so deep, a squat lobster smiles in its cozy blindness.