Though she does not look at me ,
Though she does not look
At the women in the plaza calling
For blood, more blood,
Though she pays no attention
To her mother starting to pack
Again , for New York. With
A single sweep
Of her foot, she levels the row
Of lead soldiers lined in the dirt
Like the firing squad we saw
Perform in its orchestral unison ,
Once, though only the fragment
Of a newsclip, as you
Turned your face to the empty aisle.
When I think of you, I think
Of you walking those unraked fields
Of ash smoldering on the mountainside
Above the city I know
You would never return to, not even
Those times when I am thinking of you
Thinking of Cuba.
Craig Raine
THE GREY
BOY
The captain takes a swig
at scratched binoculars,
while we light the fires
with Act One of
Lear.
There is no music now,
only food in the branches
and sometimes a sing-song
of corpses across the river,
