Today I feel on my tongue the bitterness
of being. I feel the anguish enter
through my feet. The day grows thin
as a thread. Already the light is sticky porridge.
All the pigs scream. The pigs? The pigs
of din and racket, the machines stalking
the streets, our overheated masters.
It triumphs over the weary shells
of my eyelids, the itch of petroleum,
the ay and oh of the great terrors.
Will we go back, again, to the cave?
The gates give way to a thousand
hard little demons, groaning, pawing,
whistling in this pentagram called “up-to-date.”
The street rises just like a dancing snake,
the bum, the pum, the kriiii! And here comes
anguish, dressed like a crow, to pick over
my entrails. Again, in the silence, I’m nothing
but a pigeon in the prison of my blood.
