Those were the good old days
when men were wicked and women were kind.
A bishop hangs upside down in a house of acrobats
while the sun plays chess with the moon.
Truth be told,
the last war was a godsend to the likes of Effendi Billabong,
little gangster, little coward — never liked him.
Table-tennis champion of Bosnia,
during the siege of our town, his house
purred like a cat, electricity all year round,
diesel for the generator, smuggled over Serb lines.
Cigarettes, beer and wine — import, export —
the Ukrainians were easy to bribe,
the Canadians were sticky.
Effendi has a big mouth, he loved to show
journalists old VHS cassettes of burning houses.
We had to use cold weapons that night —
he told the man from the New York Times —
this is the house of a man named Ratso.
He killed three of my men, so we torched it.
Tough luck!
Two months before the town fell,
he was helicoptered out. After the war,
he owned a gym — steroids, biceps.
He told the people what they wanted to hear.
We are warriors, they are cowards.
I’ll avenge your dead. Your murdered child.
False gods always change suffering into violence.
Laurence O’Dwyer | Mulberry Tree
Contents | Mudlark No. 75 (2023)