For the Record

   Scientists on Earth
   believe oxygen on Mars
   is behaving strangely.

   But how would they know?
   They have never visited
   that remote red rock.

   And who made them judges
   of what is normal and what is strange?
   When they know nothing of normal
   and they, themselves, are so strange.

   Have they considered instead
   that maybe oxygen behaves
   normally on Mars and behaves
   strangely on Earth?

   Or maybe oxygen
   can behave no other way
   because Mars is nasty
   and treats oxygen like
   a noxious gas.

   The HR department believes
   I'm behaving strangely.

   But how would they know?
   They have never endured
   the daily indignities
   I am subjected to.

   Have they considered instead
   that maybe I'm behaving normally - 
   given the circumstances?

   Maybe they wouldn't judge
   if you had been nasty to them;
   treated them like a noxious gas;
   left them to live life
   like cockroaches in the dark
   wondering what will happen
   when the light turns on.

   So for the record,
   if there ever is one,
   this is not my fault.

   If you had only returned 
   my calls, texts, emails,
   or come to the door
   when I pounded on it,
   your basement window
   wouldn't be broken.

   I wouldn't be bleeding 
   in your airless closet.

   Luvgood Carp, Editor-in-Chief

   First published in Boston Literary Magazine