This small boy with buttery curls
soft as bantam feathers,

cheeks and limbs that make old folk
want to hold a festival of pinch and squeeze,

he’s got an arsenal. He has alien
blam-blam space guns. He says

if there are wild animals starved outside
he will stab them with his stabbers,

and if there are baddies
he will slice them with his slicers.

How will you know they’re baddies?
He’s shocked. Because they’ve got guns to shoot us!

But if you’ve got space guns and slicers,
won’t they think you’re a baddy too?

Well, baddies want to steal our things.
They want to dead us and take our stuff.

What if the baddies are just scared, hungry,
don’t have a home, they’re cold and lonely,

only about to shoot because we seem angry
and as if we might fire first?

Well, then, they might not be baddies,
just dumb goodies,

but they still shouldn’t shoot us so
Blam Blam Blam!

Wait. Let’s go back over this. They’ve got guns,
but you do too. If they see your guns first —

No! He drops the Nerf blaster, refuses water, stories,
turns his back, finds his cuddle cloth;
at its soft-sweet body musk, bows his head
like a man just read his rights to silence.