Evening News II

--David Ferry

The face looking into the room;

Behind it light, shaking, like heat

Lightning; the face calm and knowing;

Seeing, but not seeing who I am;

The mouth may be telling something.

Something about our helplessness;

Something about the confusions of beasts;

The consequence of error; systems

Haywire, or working; the stars gone

All wrong in the body’s courses.

Out on the plain of Mars, brilliantly

Played under the lights, searched out

Beyond any answer, the game went on

Far into the night; the bloodiest came

Home from the battle seeking the prize.

The women were disgraced; hair streaming,

Pleading into the staring: buy, buy—;

Was it my daughter I was seeing?—

The humiliation was pleasing: tears,

Laughter, smiles, all mingled together.

The light swallowed itself, a balloon

Deflating; somewhere in the darkness

A murmuring let itself go.