Legion

It has been a long while 

Since this pervasive gloom

Has returned to infest

Our national backbone. 

No need to recount the multitude

Of dangers.

They are Legion.

Every evening I sit doing 

Risk Assessment. 

It may not help that recently

In the midst of a sleepy Sunday

Two men attempted to break through

Both my front and back doors

Simultaneously.

It was damn unnerving.

Thundering slams onto 

My locked doors.

Screams from the intruders

Threats from myself.

I was prepared to kill them.

Nothing I've experienced 

Is more sobering than 

Centering your blade site

On center mass

With the intent to forever stop

A beating heart.

Yes.

..the Afghani sun boils the concrete

On the streets and tarmac in Kabul.

Possibly the blood of the Innocents

Will bake into sticky reminders

Of those murdered.

.....

Night breezes stir river grasses

And chills the bodies of the hopeful minions

At our borderless south

Replete with disease and covert terrorists

Not to mention the tens of thousands

Simply searching out a dream.

.....

California is on fire.

.....

West of Nashville, bodies float

Face down 

Over what once were blueline highways.

.....

Where went our sleepy dreams?

The warm embrace of children?

The sparkling midnight eyes of lovers?

Lazy, meandering drives 

Through the heartland?

I know where mine went.

They all dissolved into  

A universe narrowed

By the laser point of my pistol

Centered on the chest of the man

I meant to kill.