Night Class

We would only get so far,

                        given the casualties

buried in each point of view.

            This one, this one, this.

To see them was to smell them.

One by one.

Then we read Wilfred Owen,

            a lyric

            whose anger comes later,

            after the specifics.

Take this face,

            how the penlight of the medic

            pierces the addled eye

                        just so far.

            In each a sky so deep

            it swallows up the stars.

            Take this gate,

how it chatters like a telegraph key,

and you wake afraid,

knowing so little of your subject.

The siren

in the distance is no stranger

            anymore.

                        It is headed

            for your hospital wing,

            where it could be a while,

            if you are waiting for your son.

We could stare at the wall

            together,

                        as some at altars do,

            where the mouths

                        of nocturnal flowers

            open to accept,

            as sacrament,

            a bee across the tongue.