Boys

for Jeff and Johnny

Men don’t learn
from their monsters.
They are content
to laugh and cheer
at the moment
of lethal injection,
to burn his paintings
in Naperville,
and to rejoice when
heads are battered in
with preacher bars
on the weight room
floor.

What of the boys?
Lying tight in their beds
as echoing booms
of vocal chords crash
slurred and rageful
through the floorboards.
They don’t wake up
in the morning
for fear of father
beating the fag out of them,
or else, their impacted
skull clots have
kept them concussed
where the swing
board hit them.

-Adam Parrow