Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Haiti

What can one poet do, or even two,
when the numbers are human
and very large?
We can write words until our eyes bleed,
stroke keys until our hearts implode,
bury the dead until the fields are full.
What separates the living from the dead?
And who is to draw the boundaries?
I say let the living honor the dead as they may.
Let any act be an act of love,
any labor a labor of community.
From the safe distances of my life, my home
we must let the living tend to their loss,
and tend to them as they bury their lives
in the land they share even with the dead.

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