Homes

All people walk around carrying
inside them, homes.
Within, their couches,
their living rooms, dinette sets
all organized in a concentric circle
around the hearth,
like courtiers around the throne.

And in those homes wherein
there no longer sits
a gargantuan, gaping mouth
a fiery hole in the plaster wall
there is a television.

Eternally, supportively, for all, always
there is this focal point on the wall.
And it either holds the heated, flaming god,
conviviality and jollity and a secret,
or the vapid empty
blue-tinged;
the silent song
of an empty sun.