With enough units downed
it earned the right
to be called disease,
the hunt for a cure
less urgent than blame.
Love’s pattern was to fall,
headlong and vulnerable,
offering the tenderest
portions to the beasts
that slithered, crouched, and slipped,
unscathed and unpunished,
from dress-up to court martial.
Malthus wrote in numbers
what the gods write in blood.
One mistake after another
until it made more sense
to simply ball the world up
and throw it away.