Dark city, night.
The moon wanders in other regions,
and the stars close
their golden eyes.
The world is dark
like a hired conscience.
One light
strung
distant and dying
like the eye of a sick dream,
a last hope.
An attic,
and someone keeps watch
in the half worlds
of poverty and strength.
How great this poverty.
It hardly fits the room
that is small as a swallow’s nest
and as plain.
The walls are bare,
only mould
and watermarks of rain
ike the wiring in homes of the rich.
The room is dull
with sighs and a musty smell.
The dogs of the wealthy
have kennels
and die in places like this.
The pine bed and table
would not sell at a flea market.
A straw chair or two:
at the foot of the bed an old pallet;
and at the head, a wormy chest—
complete furniture.
Mist and light contend
in the pale arena of the candle,
and the figures are washed away
like the flicker of a dream
in the halfdark.
A candle deludes the eye.
Or are those under this roof
so pale
so ghostly?
A family of the poor, a family of the poor.
The mother sits on the chest
with her babe.
The unhappy child
whines
sucking her dried breast.
She is deep in thoughts
that must be filled with pain,
and like snow melting from the eaves
her tears
are rolling down
on the babe …
Is she really thinking?
Tears might fall from habit,
without reason, like water from stones.
The elder child
is asleep (or is he?)
on a wall bed,
the straw sticking from a sack.
Sleep, little child, sleep
and dream into your thin hands
a piece of bread,
and your sleep will be great!
The young father
sits by the table, his face black
with the darkness
filling the room;
his brow a book
where the agonies of the world are written,
a picture
where the poverty of millions is painted.
But his eyes flame
like two comets,
fearing no one,
and everyone fearing.
He looks
far and high
until his eye is lost in the infinite
like an eagle in the clouds.