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Sarah Widenbar Poem
The boys fell out,
Quelled by violence
A lessening of intensity, now
We covered them with our duffle coats.
Thinking back on it I can see notices in gothic characters.
I no longer had the strength to move,
I lookd toward Hiroshima -
No dish in a restaurant.
We're miles ahead of them and
These are winter's last throes.
Letter to an unknown soldier:
Isn't it fabulous, even if it is Russian flesh?
Propaganda horizon,
For some mourning meant classes,
A last minute stop at the horizontal position of attention.
Tiny echoes, four more escorts:
I climbed the bridge.
The ignorance was mine, criminal instinct of self preservation.
This is forgery,
Hitler had had a closer bond that turned the scales,
A nation and its people.
Time to take.
I remembered suddenly the butt end of his rifle,
Expressionless.
Copyright © Sarah Widenbar | Year Posted 2005
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Details |
Sarah Widenbar Poem
It was intriguing, this cold dead ash.
Your grief, stained and white in a blue china bowl.
A handful of coarse sunlight spilled onto tears,
You lift your eyes, like a retreating creature troubled
By sawrming cries and phantom faces.
Somewhere in the distance, our door lay open.
We stop at the top of the stairs, on the draughty landing
I try to remember your name,
Your voice, your smile, coming home.
But remember nothing more than you standing
Watching me, quite unconsciously.
I pause and feel you begin to despair.
Then I turn and ask you to forgive me, but
You cannot hear me anymore.
Copyright © Sarah Widenbar | Year Posted 2005
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Details |
Sarah Widenbar Poem
Every night, wrists torn, he struggles.
Pulled and pinched, until he sees without a word or a sign
That there is something broken in her.
In the early hours of every day amidst mute, stupefied faces
His head drops, horrified at his own fury. In the dark
She turns and walks down the path, sobbing draughts of air.
By her side, fallen to pieces momentarily, he touches her arm.
For an instant, in his mind, there is no motion in their equilibrium.
Her stomach is rigid, his hands cold.
Alone now he remembers something worse than misery
And cries, his broad shoulders bend to the ground -
A huge factory chimney trembling in the middle of a dead town,
Swaying before it learns to fall.
He returns to their room, aware
That time has become something different, and yet
To him, there was nothing rude or untidy there.
He looks over the railings. Bows, smiles, offers.
On his last afternoon they had walked on clearly defined sides,
His intentions a cold feast of snow, ugly and bleak.
She broke off and they were both silent.
Then she kissed him until the sky seemed to fade
And her tears seemed to vanish.
Copyright © Sarah Widenbar | Year Posted 2005
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