The Rules of Engagement
Do not go out into the dark woods and kill
beavers and muskrats you have caught in traps.
Do not make fun of people at parties
who are drunk and leaving soon for the front.
Do not pick a fight with a very large scary bus driver
whose double-parked bus is blocking your car.
Do not terrorize street cats or aid and abet
anyone who is terrorizing street cats.
Do not tease Mr. Welby because he
is bald and his nose is very red.
Do not have two goldfish in a bowl as pets.
If you do, do not let one goldfish eat the other.
Do not smuggle poitín into Logan Airport
in an old lemonade bottle from the 1930s.
Do not pretend you are a suicidal gay drug addict
just to avoid going to war and dying at the front.
Do not pretend there is an end in sight.
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Today Was Beautiful
The rain has finally stopped. They re-paved my street.
I had lunch with my friends from Witchita, hamburgers
all around, talk about ruination and destitution.
Today was beautiful. We are getting a new carpet.
As always, I watched old episodes of Law and Order
until the sun came up and it was time to feed the cat.
I see dead people and they see me.
On Amtrak the other day, the Jamaican conductor told us
of his love for America. He went on and on, from Philly
to Baltimore. I get it, but love is so complicated, isn’t it?
Henceforth, it is decreed that “love” shall be called “love/hate.”
I’m so numb these days. I don’t cry anymore. I don’t get mad.
I vacuum the rugs at midnight. I memorize all the countries of
Asia and Africa. There are rumors of war, terror, brutality.
I lull myself to sleep with high-school fantasies of basketball greatness.
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No Surrender
Some people stay lonely for an eternity.
Language can’t help them. Magic eludes them.
The books they read turn to ashes. They wear
beautiful jewels and elegant suits. Even barbarians
are frightened of them. Yet they don’t know how
to milk a cow, sing like a lark or linnet,
or grow fairy-tale flowers in their gardens.
The prophets told us all about them.
The way they rub up against you uninvited.
Their tendency to say “I love you” over and over.
We might have slept in a big bed with them once
a long time ago. We might have grown wings
and flown away with them in a conversation
about promiscuity on an empty street. We may
have begged them stay as their train pulled away.
Tonight now, as the war drags on, as the monster
cuts the power cords and the people hide in subways,
desire seems like something from the Iron Age,
forgotten and forbidden. The people are weeping,
sleeping, conjuring a blue-lagoon 3-D acrylic floor
for their bathroom. They will not surrender. Instead,
they dream of all that they used to long for.
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Evacuation
So it came to pass that the game was lost
in the last inning. Someone dropped the ball.
So it was that billions were spent but nothing
was bought. So it happened that when I held
you in my arms you disappeared. So the sky
looked down on the wildfires and later despair
wept down from the clouds. So I awoke in the middle
of the night and heard a strange noise coming
from the kitchen. So the cult took over and turned
the people into sex slaves, branding them
with hot irons. So the prisoners of war wrote
farewell poems the day before their executions.
So the desperate cling to the wing of the plane.
So the victory we yearned for never came.
_______________________________________________________________________________________
Treaty
She shakes her head in dismay, looking around
his tiny apartment. How can you stand it? she asks.
The window is open, a nice breeze breathing air
into the room. Stand what? he says. This mess,
this chaos. He says: I told you a million times, this is
how I like it. She throws his broken clock in the trash.
He sits on the bed, barely moving. Not remembering.
He can’t remember anything. I used to have an
incredible memory, he says. The giant t.v. is muted,
silent news of war and government scandal flicker
in the background. She brings him coffee, chocolate,
paper towels. He knows she loves him. He just wants to sleep
all the time now. Sleep is the treaty he signed with his soul.
Terence Winch has published ten books of poems, the most recent being It Is As If Desire (Hanging Loose, 2024) and That Ship Has Sailed (Pitt Poetry Series, 2023). Winner of an American Book Award and the Columbia Book Award, he has also published two story collections and a novel. He is the guest editor for Best American Poetry 2025 and the editor of the Best American Poetry blog’s “Pick of the Week” feature. Winch is the recipient of an NEA poetry fellowship, a Gertrude Stein Award for Innovative Writing, and multiple grants from DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities and the Maryland State Arts Council. Also a musician and songwriter, he co-founded the original Celtic Thunder, the traditional Irish music group.