Elegies for Sister Satan: First Elegy
Singing is prohibited in this café.
Torture is permitted in this café.
I’ll have a double, thank you,
in time, Sister,
may I call you Sister, you
almond-eyed, unsmiling,
in this ever-changing light
that cloaks the feral world?
These dancers, do you know them?
Do they think
as they glide and spin
of what is to be
and what has been?
Do you know their names
and if so
do their names change
from earliest hours to late
and day to day?
Do their wounds show
as they mimic the music’s path?
(Sister, I apologize, but I must ask.)
Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Abu Ghraib,
Oradour, Terezín, Deir Yassin,
Vel d’Hive, Vorkuta, Magadan –
that waltz, that dance—
among the café candles
and beyond the fogged windows
the endless allée
of lightning-scarred trees
whispering fractured words
for none to understand.
All the beautiful names,
Sister, the infinite names,
roll off the tongue
innumerable as the stars
that frolic in the sea.
2017
