David Alexander

HYDRA

for Chris Alexander

There is no safe passage if we fail our children
for the price of a coffee as plazas explode

and crops fail far away and they barrel
what rain falls and pray there’s enough

for a sapling to grow but an apple won’t fall
yet you never go hungry or rise up in mutiny

but you wish on a star in a sky filled
with wishes and the sky falling dark

slaps ships filled with wishes but not enough water
and the ships spill our children and we lose them

and terrorists win or we bomb them and still
there are thousands more targets more children

so you rehash the virtue of quotas and targets
but there is no safe passage



David Alexander is the author of the chapbook Chicken Scratch from Puddles of Sky Press. He lives in Toronto.