(Yaoqi/Unsplash)

Between Korea and Vietnam,

it was my favorite dime-store gag.

The soily smell thrilled me sick.

A cardboard coin, a smudged visage

of some leader’s solemn profile,

a Lincoln, Ike, or FDR.

I snap a match against my nail

and kiss our leader’s face with it

then watch it flare, smoke, and stink:

it blooms a pleated, pinkie-sized

squirming Chinese New Year grub:

the President plumps, implodes, crumbles

into a compost nubbin of ash.

His lies die with him. My world,

ten years old, is no better place.

W. S. Di Piero’s recent books are a volume of poems, The Complaints, and Fat: New and Uncollected Prose.

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Published in the December 2023 issue: View Contents
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