Contingency

Why is everyone only an environmentalist

after they watch “Blackfish” on Netflix?

A pacifist

When they notice someone strange in the halls of their school?

A churchgoer

When their wife falls ill,

Or a poet

Because there is paper in poetry?

It is easier to

     tuck away

tragedy into the folds of a book

Or behind moving, glass pictures, to

           look away

From the bleary gaze of the sullied street man, to

               drive away

From the bellowing social drinker at a 2 am rave,

Until we become that victim,

             That bum,

That lush.