Unsong: August


A half mile back, artillery
slams its dense fists into earth.
almost thythmic.

Things we have been careful for
─daisies, lilies─
crumpled by the heat.

Traffic hollers
up and down. The armies
come and go.

In twilight,
a woman bends among geraniums.
The highway flashes past.


(From Jan Zwicky's "Thirty-seven Small Songs & Thirteen Silences". Copyright by Jan Zwicky, 2005.)