Thank You for Your Attention to This Matter
by Beth Weaver-Kreider

Thank you for your attention to this matter
this one right over here
no don’t look that way
attend please to this particular matter
to which I am currently bringing your attention
so that you are looking away
when I am over here
putting my hand in the cookie jar
taking away your money
and your health insurance
to give to my billionaire buddies
who bought me this gig

Thank you for attending to
this meaningless prattle
THIS ALL CAPS RANTING
this twittering gabble
while I am busy redacting
my name from these files
which I said did not exist
but which do unfortunately exist
and in which my name
may or may not appear once or twice
or hundreds of times

Thank you for your attention
which I will direct here
to these people I hate and I want you to hate
to these I call garbage and piggies
to these stupid women these
stupid humans doing their
stupid human tricks
so you will not look
at my bigotry
at how stupid
I am becoming
how wit-addled
at how my incompetence
daily compounds

Wait. You don’t agree with me
about the immigrants?
Then attend here to my tariffs
the greatest tariffs I tell you
for your own good
your attention please
look over here
so you do not see
boats exploding in the ocean
men in the water clinging to debris
just before your military drones
rain death upon them

Attention
Attention
Thank you
for your attention
to this matter