Their eyes are white balloons half-full of milk,
their hearts are plastic frogs with dead batteries
where their ribbits were but you have to
tell them in their ears / right
in their ears / those burning paper funnels
you have to never let them forget you are human / their lever
is a pool noodle taped to a tv remote / but you pushed PLAY
when both your legs were in a cast you listened
to Taylor Swift accompanied by a goat
so many times you watched a man leap
into a swimming pool whose thick ice / he would only break
himself with and your great aunt lives now lived in a town
where they have the state’s preeminent strawberry festival
and that anywhere has a preeminent strawberry festival
should give these killers pause. They should fold
their paws, their claws are ruddy as grated beets
but you’ve got to sing it to their knee-capped
attention / tell them your dreams the boring ones
and the ones where you save the world
without ever touching the ground