But no, seriously, hear me out:
lead-laced water drunk from leaded
Smurf or Garfield cups, old fridges
laid out like mouse traps, chemistry kits
for little arsonists, beltless backseat road trips
and ATV mishaps: the 80s tried hard
to kill all us kids dead.
At least jarts gave us a more pointedly
callous consumerism: plastic-fletched
shafts with sharp metal tips, chaos
proxies of evolution we wildly flung
skyward, waiting for the fatal thunk
as it bit into earth or flesh.
Rummaging around the garage
before another move, I found them
neatly tucked away, crusted
with childhood dirt, gave one a toss
for old time’s sake.
Looking up, trying to spot its arc
like some sun-silhouetted wasp,
it struck me:
the closing distance between point
and pierced flesh roughly equals
that from pouches of Big League Chew
to the quarter-metered death
of cigarette machines, or the shift
in pitch between shrieks of joy
and terror.