From We, the Headless Seraphim, Request

We, the headless seraphim, request

that you look us in our eyes.

That you masticate your dumb and useless words into a fine compost and plant at least one seed.

That you draw a circle of immutability around your nearest nemesis and then kiss them lightly on
the nose.

—

We, the headless seraphim, demand

a less trite word for twilight,

and a globe full of happy and bountiful farmers,

and a painting of a wombat laughing.

—

We, the headless seraphim, will not rest until

all debts are repaid by the rich and obscene fools we’ve been relegated to serve,

and Tristan Tzara is elected Secretary of Entropy,

and there are at least fifty individual words for Love for each fifty thousand separate contexts of
Love in as many colors and gradients the eye can imagine, each of which has its own spectrum of
sound, and all of which can buy groceries and shelter and clothing, and, moreover, can be
wielded as a flaming sword or worn as impervious armor, all of which can solve as much trouble
as they cause.

—

We, the headless seraphim, are the earthworms of the firmament.

You can harm us but we survive. You can bisect us but we multiply.

We have been starved by famine, violated by conquest, evaporated in drought, and neared our
own impossible deaths in plague.

Our conditions are not elevated because we serve the mad hammer of “God.” Even in heaven,
there is physics.

—

We, the headless seraphim, are growing tired of having to repeat ourselves, but we are terrified
of being forgotten.

We are, after all, a pathos.

We want to make you cry before you think.

We want to watch you slobbering on the saccharine laws of attraction.

We want to burn down the ignominious properties of the rich.

We want to give all earthly fauna a warm and necessary bath.

 Eric Tyler Benick is the author of the forthcoming poetry collection the fox hunts (PANK, 2023), as well as three chapbooks of poetry. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Copper Nickel, Hobart, Oyez Review, Southeast Review, Bat City Review, Washington Square Review, and elsewhere. He runs Ursus Americanus Press and lives in Brooklyn.