Havin’ a gun around is
An invitation to shoot you.²
If you want to play with firearms,
You’d do better to take a pop at Yourself!³
Your guts is all in your trigger finger.⁴
Love, chimes the Saints & Angels—
Hate shrieks the gun-metal Princess.⁵
Only the monstrous Anger of guns—
Only the stuttering rifle’s rapid rattle …
The shrill, demented choir of the wailing shells.⁶
How martial is this place! Had I a Mighty Gun,
I think I’d shoot the human race—and to Glory run!⁷
Tell those who inherit their
Rifles—the Legacy of our Blood!⁸
Even after people turn to flee, the bullets
Pursue them, lodging themselves in receding backs.⁹
Who’s got the gun, who owns the gun,
Who sold the gun, who pulls the gun,
And who does the gun let Sleep?¹⁰
¹ Arthur Miller, in a telegram to Lyndon B. Johnson
² Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird
³ Anton Chekhov tr. Constance Garnett, Uncle Vanya
⁴ Budd Schulberg, On the Waterfront
⁵ Diane Kendig, A Cento on Frida Kahlo’s “Diego on My Mind”
⁶ Wilfred Owen, Anthem for Doomed Youth
⁷ Emily Dickinson, My Friend Attacks My Friend!
⁸ Mahmoud Darwish tr. Amira El-Zein, The Everlasting Indian Fig
⁹ Arundhati Roy, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
¹⁰ Erica Hunt, Mourning Birds