Ian Williams
Ian C. Williams is an Appalachian poet and the author of Every Wreckage (2024 Fernwood Press). His work has been included in Fourteen Hills, Moon City Review, Salamander, and Appalachian Review, among others. He is the editor-in-chief for Jarfly: A Poetry Magazine. Williams lives with his wife and two sons in Fairmont, West Virginia.
MAKE SURE TO SMILE AND GREET STUDENTS AS YOU GUIDE THEM THROUGH THE WEAPONS DETECTION CHECKPOINT
But remember that every child is a loaded gun.
Any backpack or blank expression could smuggle
enough bullets to empty this cafeteria in seconds.
But this isn’t pessimism. This is just a lesson
in threat assessment—in self-destruction.
How many bags can I check, latex-gloved
with suspicion before my students stop
being children? Before they become statistics.
It’s not personal—just procedure.
But the problem of picking between necessary evils
is that we’re always wrist deep in the oleaginous slick of evil.
The list of options is rotten the whole way down.
These mornings I pray for blessings found
in absences. For hallways free of gunfire.
For empty funeral parlors.
Let the lilies stay in their beds of wet soil.
Let there be fireflies instead of muzzle flares.
Let them live. Let them live. Let them.