two poems by Thomas Cochran    4. Make an impact close to the walls and push into the details of community. Become a member by gardening for this devastating disease. Add another enticement until next season. Log on now—your cart is waiting beside your family’s honor. Challenge a brave man who lives for fighting. Laugh like a whipped dog who needs amusement. Wash away those amenities and re-establish breakfast in bed.  6. The city, it is true, runs down the hill with a clean new smell, pharmaceutical. Familiar mechanisms invite you, saying, “Please. This is all. Please.” So plainspoken. So compelling. So final. And you, a marionette, stand before the gate calling your challenges while the archers blow out their arms in preparation. Still, you know the best spots to hide the spoons and washboards, so you push on to the bridges from which you watch the lowering sun sink behind the fragrant pines. The light transcends your skepticism.  60. The failure here signals a turning point in time. We are left to wonder how something we can’t call bad, merely obvious, still misses the opportunity of doing justice to the very issues it raises. For a while, the new project looks as if it will offer an appeal to nationalism, but this idea soon gives way to softer designs, erasing the possibility of indictment. There is a cost to be extracted and, indeed, the final joke is private.  

Make an impact close to the walls

and push into the details of community.

Become a member by gardening

for this devastating disease.

Add another enticement

until next season.

Log on now—your cart is waiting

beside your family’s honor.

Challenge a brave man

who lives for fighting.

Laugh like a whipped dog

who needs amusement.

Wash away those amenities

and re-establish breakfast in bed.

The city, it is true, runs down the hill

with a clean new smell, pharmaceutical.

Familiar mechanisms invite you,

saying, “Please. This is all. Please.”

So plainspoken. So compelling. So final.

And you, a marionette, stand before the gate

calling your challenges while the archers

blow out their arms in preparation.

Still, you know the best spots

to hide the spoons and washboards,

so you push on to the bridges

from which you watch the lowering sun

sink behind the fragrant pines.

The light transcends your skepticism.

60.

The failure here signals

a turning point in time.

We are left to wonder

how something we can’t call

bad, merely obvious, still misses

the opportunity of doing justice

to the very issues it raises.

For a while, the new project looks

as if it will offer an appeal

to nationalism, but this idea

soon gives way to softer designs,

erasing the possibility of indictment.

There is a cost to be extracted

and, indeed, the final joke is private.