POEMS
Here is the shrapnel's odyssey
Cruising all corners of the flesh,
Exploding at each port of call.
Reel on reel
The bombs ride into office,
Breaking the city's will;
And rifles edit out the living breath.
Reel on reel
We
film
the photogenic face of violence:
His leer is on the lonely men
Who wither by the waters of Babylon;
His glee is on the children
Pieced together with their dolls.
Reel on reel
In close·up or dissolve,
A terror documents the mind.
Whatever the angle,
We focus on betrayal;
And we who are assigned to life
Are newsreel to this death.
David Schubert
THE SNOW IN THE MOUSE WIND
I.
Its cigarette twitches like a heart;
It smells of smoke, carbolic acid;
While wishes snore, it will write
Letters to the queen of hearts;
Its shuddered face it could not stop
Voice of the screaming, shrill roof tops;
Suffering with each bone it is;
It could not stop its ghastly sweat;
Choked in a terrible childbed.
And every street, too old, too cold,
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