Love and Revenge

Mom writes in her will that if anybody
fights over stuff it all goes to the dogs
at the Keller County Shelter

Mac and I, we don’t fight
not that we want to deprive the coon hounds
too old to go squirrel hunting
or the overstimulated pit bull mixes
dropped through the night slot
when the new baby arrives

But at the millennial end of the decline
from pre-famine Ireland to post-industrial Appalachia
as the number one cash crop devolved from moonshine
to methamphetamine and the body count from speed and oxycontin