After a War

After a War

Inklings
Train in the Snow
Suitcase
Patterns
Creed
After a War

In this small resort there are no stoved-in
skulls of houses, no terraces of graves,
only the ranks of the waves escorting the Sunday morning,
its ordinary quiet for disrupted lives,
and the crowds of hotels waiting.

Under the palms on the waterfront, a tall
groom, manly of course, and a bride, in a white
flow of silk sheer and passionate as a waterfall,
parade among their guests in the April sunlight
as the cameras flare and tremble.

The face of a nun is squared in the upstairs
window of the church. Her approving eyes
offer perfection to the couple as they enter a Mercedes
and depart on the journey of their lives
between the blood of the land and the calm of the sea.

In the quiet of the dispersal, a tennis player
fires shots at the air. Outside a café
two men light cigarettes, as a distant engine roars,
and they raise small cups of black coffee
saluting themselves in the aftermath of war.

AuthorTim Philips
2018-08-21T17:23:20+00:00 July 1st, 2005|Categories: Poetry, Blesok no. 43|0 Comments