Franz Kafka

He wrote after the insurance office closed. Prague, German on the page, Jewish in a city that made that a daily negotiation. A few stories while he lived. Three unfinished novels in a drawer he asked a friend to burn: a trial with no charge, a castle that will not admit you, an America he had never seen. Max Brod did not light the match. The insect is what everyone remembers. The rest is offices, fathers, hunger artists, and a joke so dry it still cuts.