LIKE LOST CONFETTI
(all they have to say)
The youthful marvel concedes time's only way -
passages and markings, small items falling in
one breath from windows and sills, while down
below those oily, minion'd masses cheer and swirl.
The spinning top and the bright-faced lark,
all together, go on. Life's drama knows
only too well the stage.
-
Watching even Shakespeare on a screen is nothing
more, really, than light - moving, cinescope images
beaten and lame. Then the laugh line, then the girl.
Then the worm, then, of course, the corpse. It's
all and everywhere the same.
-
To those who have never lost anything, it
is said, 'take this back, you mutilated savage.
You seem too insincere for all this good fortune.'
Mere badinage, all that is - a broken line once
more, from a drunken Shakespearean play.
-
The secretaries are lined up at the window.
Six or seven floors up I see them bending over
the ledge - all those guys and girls so happy
and choice, throwing papers from windows
in one huge voice - 'we are limber, and we
are sound, and all this life is joy! Yay, perhaps...
but that's all we've found.'
-
And then I realize, in a moment of my own,
one too tortured to enjoy, this is (all well)
all they have to say.
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