Watermark

there is no good news

 

this room this bright quilt 

winter waits on the other side 

of these dark windows 

elsewhere cities 

in dust and rubble 

everywhere cities 

 

on fire all this has nothing 

to do with me the naked child running 

through fire has nothing to do with me 

these buildings become dust 

have nothing to do with me

I sit on this bright quilt 

 

blue and white and red 

patterns of flowers and thread 

I drink from my modern porcelain 

blue and white cup a pale 

version of Italian cappuccino 

what is true? who is to blame?

 

I open the bedroom window winter 

is coming as it has here for many 

generations of my line of which 

I am the last these are not my 

children they have nothing to do 

with me

 

who is innocent? they carry 

small broken bodies of children 

holding shoulders holding knees 

the bodies bent loosely heads 

tipped back limp arms dropping 

in the evening I turn down the heat 

~ sb

The Bedroom

It’s a large room, as bedrooms go. It has two double windows. The shutters are closed. The bed is metal, painted blue. It’s a narrow bed, neatly made. An old radio stands on the bedside table. The only sounds this room hears are from that radio. 

The floor is golden oak, showing its age. The walls, too, are expressive, with cracks in the plaster on every side. The ceiling boasts a schoolhouse light and fan, turning slowly this autumn day. The lamp on the bedside table was an oil lamp, with a chimney, electrified now with a flickering bulb, a hint of the original flame. There is no soot on the glass chimney. 

Books and papers are piled on the bedside table, the only suggestion of disorder. Even the medicines are labeled and neatly organized in lines. If a cat leaves fur on the quilt, there is no sign of it.