THE MUSEUM ISSUE Kyle G. Dargan   After Visiting the New Newseum When a dog bites a man, that is not news, because it happens so often. But if a man bites a dog, that is news. ~John Bogart, inscribed on the new Newseum welcome theatre Some of you are men. The remainder, mutts—who do not speak, who fetch the morning sun with limber tongues and barks like muted horns. Unless struck in traffic, a dog dies in private holds—transitioned from alive to unseen, barely a tally. When hunger bites the expected, when blind rockets dismember the expected, call them by their names. When a virus takes shelter in the expected body, when the written word remains foreign to expected eyes, remember their faces—chronically passé— as this is all news of the dog. No ink will be shed for them. Their press conferences will be small circles inscribed with howls, limp tails and clawed clay. In a blue rage, in fear, a dog may bite a dog—which is less than news, less than assumption. “Reality,” it is. “Sad” even. Neither pause the printers nor pique our heart’s Nielsen ratings. Men are news. When man bites dog—his teeth, blackened with headlines, breaking skin— only then will the dog become news, become man—worthy, dying, and worthy. Kyle G. Dargan is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at American University and the author of two poetry collections, The Listening (UGA 2004) and Bouquet of Hungers (UGA 2007). He is the founder and editor of POST NO ILLS magazine and was most recently the Managing Editor for Callaloo.   Published in Volume 10, Number 1, Winter 2009.   Read more by this author: Kyle Dargan: Wartime Issue Kyle Dargan Kyle Dargan: Langston Hughes Tribute Issue