Poetry Report: Dawn Breaks

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“In Japan, hairline fractures appear
on the wings of Boeing Dreamliners”

Maybe someone has some really big duct tape we can fix this with.

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Dawn Breaks


In Japan, hairline fractures appear
on the wings of Boeing Dreamliners.

Hairline fractures appear
at the base of my skull
when I think of the Russians
crawling over the Crimea.

Hairline fractures
are collected one by one
by women on International Women's Day
in the homemade baskets they've always carried,
one woman turning to another,
did you know it's International Women's Day?

Hairline fractures of oil
are reported in the ocean
as they search for a lost
Malaysian plane.

Hairline fractures bloom
across the beach
as a mother tries to strip
the mother from her name, driving
her children into the ocean.

Just another morning with
hairline fractures all over
the marbled surface
of the world's butcher block

and I'm just another old citizen,
looking for breakfast,
trying to crack open
a frozen block of soup
with a heavy coffee mug
and a steak knife.

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