A Moment of War

It is night like a red rag

drawn across the eyes

the flesh is bitterly pinned

to desperate vigilance

the blood is stuttering with fear.

O praise the security of worms

in cool crumbs of soil

flatter the hidden sap

and the lost unfertilized spawn of fish!

The hands melt with weakness

into the gun’s hot iron

the body melts with pity

the face is braced for wounds

the odour and the kiss of final pain.

O envy the peace of women

giving birth and love like toys

into the hands of men!

The mouth chatters with pale curses

the bowels struggle like a nest of rats

the feet wish they were grass

spaced quietly.

O Christ and Mother!

But darkness opens like a knife for you

and you are marked down by your pulsing brain

and isolated

and your breathing,

your breathing is the blast, the bullet,

and the final sky.

Spanish frontier, 1937