In the haunted valley of the now-gone
running and thundering horses,
their silence is loud. A strangeness
dwells here
where thousands of humans
lived beneath ground,
where different believers
scratched out the eyes of saints.
Two stories exist: In one the eyes were removed
so the saints would not see crimes committed
during the war. Others say the eyes were powdered
and stirred into suspension.
Some drank the holy emulsion
for holy vision.
There are always crimes and there will always be
those who tell.
Still, olive trees, dates, it is a land
of milk and honey, the opposite as well;
many-eyed potatoes grow in clay,
grapevines in dry hot sun.
I do not know the sins of this country
but know one of them has to be fear
of open eyes. Another is the missing sound
of hooves running away
with the first spirit of this place,
but always it is a human lack of vision.