Today's poem is by Joyce Mansour (translated by Molly Bendall)

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When the war rains down over breakers and beaches
I'll go out to meet it armed with my look
My hair done up in a heavy sob
I'll stretch out flat on my face
On the wing of a bomber
And I'll wait
When the cement flares up off the sidewalks
I'll follow the path of bombs through the faces of the crowd
I'll stick to the ruins
Like a tuft of fur on a nude
My eye will follow the long contours of grief
The dead glittering with sunlight and blood
Will fall silent at my sides
Nurses gloved with skin
Will wade in the smooth liquid of human life
And the dying will burn
Like straw castles
Colonnades will sink
Stars will moan
Even flannel pants will be swallowed
In the giant room of fear
And I'll sneer my bared teeth violet with rapture frenzied
Generous hysteric
When the war rains down over breakers and beaches
I'll go out to meet it armed with my look
My hair done up in a heavy sob

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Copyright © 2023 Joyce Mansour, Molly Bendall All rights reserved
from "In The Gloom On The Left
Veliz Books
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission