lineups circling
conic earth mounds. The pattern
of travail- ceaseless, unfluctuant-
commences in first light, or predawn glimmers: bobbing heads,
sharp elbows, bony half-clad hips
fading in mists, fog pockets . . .. Now smoke trails white out
three black figures
(typewriter errors painted over
with
liquid
paper),
the next
two men in line perfectly intact;
on the terrace below, a lean headless
torso leads a legless muscly physique, the missing parts
of some figures matching up with
amputations of near, or distant, tier mates. The witness's
eye assembles
far-flung body quarters, stray limbs,
into composite
wholes: anatomies
glimpsed through slow-thinning smoke
puffs , rising ground fogs ... .
If
one trips
and falls from the ledge, the whole row may follow, dragged
down the hill face: one chain-rank,
collapsing on another, could trigger an all-but-unstoppable
roller flux . . .
Free-falling bodies . . . An avalanche
of mortals . ...
