It Is Sweet and Fitting

John Mann

He decides to join up. Age not
relevant this time. They told
him somebody’s butt needed
kicking. He is given a call-
back number, a couple of bags
of pinto beans. They will send 
him west and north. His
nickname will be Mr. Compass.
Declarative sentences only
need apply. Discharge a
possibility. He is hungry.
All these years a gnawing.
Look at the religious ones
at the side of the road
filling their sacks with anger.
Dogs have bigger hearts.

John Mann has had poems published in many literary journals. He won a poetry fellowship from the Illinois Arts Council in 2002. His play, Mass Destruction, Weapons Of, was produced by the New World Arts Theatre in Goshen, Indiana, in 2004. Finishing Line Press published Wyoming, a chapbook of poems, in 2008. He was a resident fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts in 2008.

“It Is Sweet and Fitting” appears in our Spring 2010 issue.