When bundles of children and mothers
walk with all certainty and calmness
across civilized streets on their way to school,
it will be a cold day. It will be winter.
That day, Venn Diagrams: the union of sets.
A pigeon and a chicken both lay eggs.
A Lutheran and a Catholic both love Jesus.
A shark skin suit and a leather jacket
both hide guns. Putin dresses for the disco.
He shuffles in the big guns and tanks.
He needs a shill for look out while he
busses Russians out of the overlapping
subset with Ukraine. We left Afghanistan
and the markets tumbled.
I ensconce myself
in my studio, and my family remains
in our own house. My son will snack
before breakfast while his mother finishes
her rest, and in the deeper sleep
we can have in the morning because
it can catch us up like a purse-seine,
and under the weight of sea water
and sister sardines we lie paralyzed,
she’ll dream of a boy playing with his cars,
his father busy. She is safe in her body
in our house. He is safe in his senses
tucked away in our home. His father
throws pots, casting circles in stone.
Now is the time to be collecting wood,
time to put up berries and beans,
Romas and peas, time to shore up rice
in every glass jar. At home my son builds
a fort from cushions and blankets.
He’s crawling in on all fours to nibble
on sesame. Somewhere, a drum beat.
Somewhere a forgotten acorn sprouts a root.
C. Mikal Oness is the author of Oracle Bones, winner of the Lewis & Clark Poetry Prize, and Water Becomes Bone (New Issues Press). His poems have appeared in numerous journals throughout the U.S. His book, Works and Days, is due from Cornerstone Press in 2026. He lives on a cottage farm in Southeastern Minnesota with his wife, Elizabeth Oness. He is the founding editor of Sutton Hoo Press, a literary fine press (www.suttonhoopress.com) as well as The Last Press (www.thelastpress.com). He is also a potter and a re-emergent alpinist hungrily exploring our diminishing natural world.