Usually a target is pinned over the heart. Assuming the marksmen hit the target, the heart ruptures and rain falls on old snow. Tonight the stars shine good and strong and allow for an even faster death. As soon as the cops and soldiers open the cage to retrieve the body, the eye mounts like a strange balloon toward infinity. Why there are always more volunteers than spots on the firing squad. 

Howie Good, a journalism professor at SUNY New Paltz, is the author of several poetry collections, including most recently Beautiful Decay and The Cruel Radiance of What Is from Another New Calligraphy and Fugitive Pieces from Right Hand Pointing Press. He co-edits White Knuckle Press with Dale Wisely.