POEMS
Next morning you'll see us alive
Healthy as usual behind our windows;
Every sinew is old and our voices shrivelled
But we have survived the selling and living with lies
As our fathers survived their fathers' betrayal,
As we ourselves, by our fear, breed the moribund future.
Milton Kaplan
THE SLEEPER
He stirs a little, smiles, and stretches out
Luxuriously-he can sleep when rain
<:;laws at the heaving flanks of window pane
And fang-toothed ice clings to the trembling house
Relentlessly, for sleep comes doubly sweet
When maddened wind tears at the walls with shriek
Of rage, and races madly round and round
To rake the huddled house with talon-sound,
And danger snarls until the man is warm
With peace as he lies snugly there with storm
Outside and him inside and safe from harm.
And all the red brick words are mortared tight;
The wooden words fit firmly, joint in joint,
And glass may rattle but it holds the night
At bay outside, and peace flares bright to print
Its shadow on the wall.
And there
h~
sleeps
In blanket words wrapped thick to keep him warm,
But bolted door is only wood, and wood
Can rot; the bricks can crumble; glass can break,
So he must lie on straw to prick his sleep
Astir before the white teeth of the storm
Are in his throat. Who sleeps on feather words,
Beware! he sleeps too well; he may not wake.
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