History

          after Haydn, Op. 64, No. 2, Adagio

It is quiet now.
The nameless officers for State Security
shrug on their overcoats
and head home through pre-dawn streets.
Oiled locks
turn, then turn again.
The general snores.
You will think it cold,
the way it fingers
open eyes, the darkened cheekbones,
the blood between the legs.
You will think it deaf as generals
the way it stands beside the ones still dying
and moves on.
But see
how weightlessly it gathers them,
the gold curl and the ebony,
with what tenderness
the folded silence of the ribs.

Jan Zwicky
Poetry International
Special Double Issue: English Language Poetry
From Around The World
Issue 7/8, 2003-4

Copyright © 2003 by Poetry International
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.

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