Tag: gun rights

Trigger Warning

By Flavian Mark Lupinetti

Never before has my hospital seen
such dismembered torsos and pulverized brains,
results of a shooting with an AR-15.

The speed of a bullet from an AR-15
creates cavitation through muscles and veins.
A shot to the shoulder can rupture the spleen.

All of our doctors and nurses convene,
yet it’s futile to treat what are really remains,
these gobbets of protoplasm rendered obscene.

It distresses us we cannot follow routine—
bring a halt to the hemorrhage, alleviate pains—
but to rush to the OR dishonest. I mean,

there’s nothing to save after seeing this scene.
Kids of a country where the gun owner reigns,
doomed never forever to reach age thirteen.

Of the lethalmost species of killing machine—
bazookas, gas, napalm, presidential campaigns—
accessorized with a 55-round magazine,
nothing compares to the AR-15.

Flavian Mark Lupinetti, a poet, fiction writer, and cardiac surgeon, received his MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. His poems and stories have appeared in Bellevue Literary Review, Cutthroat, december, Redivider, and ZYZZYVA. Mark’s chapbook, The Pronunciation Part, will be published by The Poetry Box in 2025. Mark lives in New Mexico.

Photograph by clappstar via a Creative Commons license.

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It’s Complicated

By Mark Williams

 

I’m scrolling through my Facebook feed—sunsets,
cats, lost dogs, cats—when I see a post
from a friend I’ve known for thirty-plus years. Someone
like someone you know, I bet. Your someone
might roof Habitat homes, deliver meals to shut-in’s,

conduct sing-a-longs at elder cares, teach kids to read.
Without divulging my someone, I think it’s fair to say,
on balance, his scale tips to the good—
as your someone’s scale tips, most likely,
on most days, anyway. The post in question

refers to a certain President of the United States
who wants to outlaw semiautomatic guns, a first step
in outlawing all guns and if you are not afraid to show it,
re-post this, it says. This, three days
after the most recent carnage. How is this possible?

So don’t be surprised when your friend re-posts or compares
bullhorns in Nashville to handguns at the Capitol
or spouts the dangers of firearm registries. But
if you figure things out—how a someone like this
can be a someone like that—let me know.

I could be dying to hear from you.

 

Mark Williams’s poems have appeared in Writer’s Resist, The Southern Review, Nimrod, Rattle, and The American Journal of Poetry. Kelsay Books published his collection, Carrying On, in 2022. His fiction has appeared in The Baffler, Eclectica, The First Line, The Write Launch, and Cleaver. He lives in Evansville, Indiana.

Image credit: Golden Gate Blond via Cyberbullying Research Center under “Fair Use.”

A note from Writers Resist

Thank you for reading! If you appreciate creative resistance and would like to support it, you can make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist from our Give a Sawbuck page.