Their shadows haunt them
and won’t let go. Their sharp nails
are embedded in
their shadow bodies
and shadow selves. Their long day
is full of shadows.
They are us. They glow
furiously in the night
casting fierce shadows
that consume the world.
Once they had begun
they found it hard to stop. Time
rolled into a ball
and ran down the hill
of its intentions, crushing
those in its steep path,
accelerating
through cities. Time was fiercer,
having grown larger
and far too heavy.
Where is life? What spot
of earth is ready for it?
Is it sheltering
in a burning house?
Is it setting fire to its
own lost furniture?
Is it on the moon,
bathed in silver, listening
to the stunned stars? Where
might it be going?
We read one small word
After another. How slight
And ineffectual
they seem. Only words,
we say (in words). Waste of breath.
A case of breathing
meaning into air
as if air could hold meaning.
Yet something hangs there
much like a person.
What we remember
is not the long queue of tanks
but the lone figure
standing before them,
figures waiting in doorways,
figures at windows,
figures in shadows,
watching, preparing to die
on their own pavements
as the tanks roll in.
