Life In Wartime

There are bodies that stay home and keep living.

Wisteria and Queen Anne’s Lace

But women and children too.

And countless men at gasoline stations.

Schoolteachers who resemble candles,

Boys with metabolisms geared to the future,

Musicians trying for moon effects…

The sky, which cannot expire, readies itself with clouds

Or a perfect blue

Or halos or the amoebic shapes

Of things to come.

The railway weeds are filled with water.

How do living things carry particles

Of sacrifice? Why are gods talking in the corn ?

Enough to feel the future underfoot.

Someone is crying three houses down.

Many are gone or are going.

S.K.   

 

Comments

[Boyd W. Benson]

Steve,
I wish you'd post more poems on your blog. Your poems cut through the babble. This one's a gem -- "schoolteachers who resemble candles" -- "why are gods talking in the corn?"

Please! I'm greedy. Give me more.