The chicken-hearted bus driver lives next door,
burns his leaves in a lopsided heap,
opens the back of the bus and hoses a Jordan of juice boxes and gum wrappers
out into the road. His wife sneers from the doorway
then goes inside to mainline a game of spades
off the internet. Yesterday
he killed his bitches' puppies with a shovel in the yard
bagged them
and threw them into the river
while she mainlined a game of spades
off the internet and dreamt of her young body afire from coca and
strong thighs.

Three years from now, their names will be chiseled into granite blocks
and hoisted onto the wall of victims.
A tiny girl, face wet (her parents nod, approve of tears)
will press her fingertips into the letters and delight
at their roughness, how warm they seem
next to the cool polish of flat stone.

Marc Pietrzykowski lives in Atlanta, GA, with his wife, a dog, and an unfixed number of cats. He has had work published recently in Red Fez, Mastodon, Fine Madness, Pleiades, and various other places.