"Christopher Mulrooney has written poems in Guarnica, Vanitas, Beeswax, The Deliquent, Moloch, and fourW"
the poisoner’s wife
in the cool like lemonade
of a hot summer’s day he went
as though it were unto a pool
the sodium he administered
made us a great salt cellar
with appurtenances of a modern-day Cellini
the furnishings and fixtures round the pool
the ask it man
in his pastel dragon shirt
slack pantaloons
steely hair and frames
he gives the world of information
the virtual sign of no more hope
beyond a certain point
and thence no whence
new faces of whenever
there is such an arduous
songbook in every generation
you can’t say this is
such a tonsillectomy
without you calling you such hogs
with a hoot in a holler
utterly disregarded
save for the return cantillation
