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  • Home
  • About
    • About Us
    • Contributors
    • Support Us
  • Submit
  • Current Issue
  • Archive
    • Volume I >
      • Issue I
      • Issue II
      • Issue III
      • Issue IV
    • Volume II >
      • Issue I
      • Issue II
      • Issue III
      • Issue IV
    • Volume III >
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      • Issue IV
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    • Volume V >
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    • Volume VI >
      • Issue I
      • Issue II

Don't Say You Weren't Warned

by Richard Merelman 
The wilderness extends from here to there.
Be careful. If you’re in a hunter's blind
From now to then, the wild is everywhere.

Perhaps you dream you dance like Fred Astaire
On ceilings. Don’t you try it. Change your mind.
The wilderness extends from here to there

In thickets, brambles, jungle rot. Beware
Of mires; leeches dine on humankind.
From now to then the wild is everywhere

Blooming in parking lots, a county fair,
Neighborhoods where rates of crime have climbed.
The wilderness extends from here to there:

A barren heart, a knife, a failed affair.
The rite of blood is never far behind.
From now to then the wild is everywhere

Disguised. You say you’re civilized? You swear
It? Telling lies is how you’ve been designed.
The wilderness extends from here to there,
From now to then. The wild is everywhere.

Richard Merelman is Professor of Political Science, ( Emeritus) University of Wisconsin, Madison. He has published four volumes of poetry, of which the most recent, A Door Opens (Fireweed, 2020), received an Outstanding Achievement Award in 2021 from the Wisconsin Library Association