M. A. Schaffner
Environmental Rule Making
The Department of Living Animals
proposed adding several new species
to the Do-Not-Eradicate register
despite the protests of leading candidates
for rapture. This is where the buffalo
roamed before the nickel, and whooping cranes
lobbied for a few more summers. Pigeons
jumbled their applications, the result
still evident on every monument.
The office itself was long since swallowed
by a facile argument involving
contributions and claimed efficiencies.
The outcome appears to pedestrians
who venture onto the National Mall:
confused songbirds wondering where to file,
rodents with a compelling back story,
a stray frog flaunting its extra members.
No one remains to tell them what they lost.
proposed adding several new species
to the Do-Not-Eradicate register
despite the protests of leading candidates
for rapture. This is where the buffalo
roamed before the nickel, and whooping cranes
lobbied for a few more summers. Pigeons
jumbled their applications, the result
still evident on every monument.
The office itself was long since swallowed
by a facile argument involving
contributions and claimed efficiencies.
The outcome appears to pedestrians
who venture onto the National Mall:
confused songbirds wondering where to file,
rodents with a compelling back story,
a stray frog flaunting its extra members.
No one remains to tell them what they lost.
M. A. Schaffner has poetry recently published or forthcoming in Stand (UK), the Beloit Poetry Journal, The Hollins Critic, ARC (CA), and The North (UK). Other works include the collection, The Good Opinion of Squirrels (Word Works, 1997) and the novel, War Boys (Welcome Rain, 2002). When not writing Schaffner works as a civil servant in Washington.
Page(s) 35
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The