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M.J. Arcangelini

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TED KACZYNSKI'S CABIN


As my country goes collectively more mad

every day, I keep thinking that Ted had the right

idea with that cabin; get away from everyone,

live off the grid, quietly, in the wilderness

with only that which is required for life,

that which gives one pleasure and sustenance,

then see to it that no one can get to you.


The bombings are where he went wrong.

He could have continued living securely

in his cabin if he hadn’t started killing people,

if he’d been able to settle for writing about

the rising evils of technology and what he

thought needed to be done about them. But

writing it all down was not enough for him.


Ted's dead now, suicide in a prison hospital,

his cabin no longer tucked away, decomposing

in Montana. The FBI has carefully dismantled it,

like London Bridge, then reassembled it at their

headquarters in Washington, DC; a trophy,

a stuffed marlin, a mounted stag’s head, antlers

to hold hats and coats, Mardi Gras beads.


ELEGY FOR LAMB CHOP


How perverse of Shari Lewis to

call her cute little hand puppet,

her alter ego, Lamb Chop.

Was it some kind of sneaky

memento mori for us

unsuspecting kids? Hinting that

we too may become someone’s

favorite dinner some day?

Did that really fly right past

the parents, who should have

known better, who should have

protected us but probably

thought it simply cute and

didn’t understand Latin anyway?

Or were they just not paying attention?

Why did it stop with Lamb Chop?

Why not a pig puppet named Bacon?

Or a cute cartoon cow called Hamburger?

Let’s teach the kids about real life,

not hand puppets and cartoons but

wars of bloodsucking greed, despots,

corporations christened as persons

by a collaborationist supreme court,

legally sanctioned rape and plunder

endorsed by your favorite religion.

Why not teach them that?

The fist clenched within the sock puppet.


M.J. (Michael Joseph) Arcangelini was born 1952 in western Pennsylvania. He has resided in northern California since 1979. His work has been published in many magazines, online journals, over a dozen anthologies, & 6 collections, the most recent of which is “Pawning My Sins” from Luchador Press, 2022.






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