"Pigeons."
Wherever I go to find peace or an island
under palms in the afternoon, at midnight
to pity my neighborhood, at dawn in the shrubs
to look for a child, I hear them.
They fly by applauding themselves.
I see them.
They pray as they walk.
Their eyes are halos around a pit.
They look amazed.
Who are these that come as a cloud
to our windows, who rush up like smoke before the town burns.
You will find one on a mountain, in a carpenter shop,
at home, on the lawn of an old estate, at the library,
in the forehead of paradise.
Whoever is mad can accuse them.
Thousands were killed in a day.
What happens to them, happens to me.
When I can't sleep, they moan.
And I'm there, and it's still like that.