Poem 379

This was sparked by a news article about the brave attempts by families in some tyrannical regime (I forget which) to not allow the disappeared to entirely vanish …

( I like the triple repetition of stones and flowers, the way the camellias provide a splash of colour, how the poem converges into the half-rhyme of gather/flowers/brothers, and the double meaning in recapture … )

Airport Road

They took my brother
        headlights
        between the flowers

I have made this stone and dragged it
to the place on the road to the airport
     where dust invaded his body

many tongues are stilled
flattened to earth 
inside the planes' shriek
                                                many are on the road
a line of ants in the midday
carrying stones and flowers

they took my brother
                                        they took a thousand
brothers
                nieces and nephews play in the trees
                in the street 
                throwing down heavy pink
camellias that explode
                                            like hearts

ants on the road
under the midday planes
                we gather
                                   with stones 
                                   with flowers
to recapture
                       our brothers