Drones
Drones
By Jennifer L. Knox
Friends, we’re living in a golden, fleeting moment wherein rich
people are buying very expensive toys that fly higher than
airplanes and can land anywhere— on your fire escape, in
your yard—and photograph you
through your curtains with a surveillance camera, record things
you’re saying with a high-powered microphone. Scientists
originally built the toy to murder people
in other countries, and now rich people in this country want
to buy them. Why? I have absolutely no idea, but I can’t wait
to kill one: shoot it with a shotgun, shoot it with the hose,
wing it with rocks, pick the wings off, light it on fire, and
stomp the plastic bits to splinters. Rich people will be
outraged that their toys are being destroyed, then lobbyists
will make destroying the toys illegal, so we must move fast.
The cleverest of us already are: down in our basements, under
the gun.
The New York Times Book Review said Jennifer L. Knox's new book, Days of Shame and Failure, "hits, with deceptive ease, all the poetic marks a reader could want: intellectual curiosity, emotional impact, beautiful language, surprising revelation and arresting imagery." Jennifer is the author of four books of poems. Her work has appeared four times in the Best American Poetry series as well as The New York Times, The New Yorker, and American Poetry Review. She teaches at Iowa State University. www.jenniferlknox.com