White phosphorus
like a net
in the night sky
cast with exquisite precision
great dolorous spines, outlines
of a skirt a mile wide, a dome, an embrace
soft extensions of descending woolly light
choreographed, unhurried
Beautiful
you have to say it
you are not even at the border
like the journalist telling about it or the other one
who is filming it
as it happens, LIVE printed across the screen
you are far away in Europe they can't see
what will happen either, what is beginning
now to happen
as the obscurant
so meticulously measured
begins to touch and touch the ground between the buildings
doing what is does best,
predicted
* * *
A sent photo
A child's face
plane with the pavement
like a mosaic
pieced, flat
the pavement is a house levelled
the word is rubble
the word is collateral
a child's face
flat to the ground
gray, inset
a perfect fit
the earth and bricks and bits of cement
pressed around it
no blood
not even her hair
just the entire face
moon round
part of the picture
icon among all the other fragments
melted into one surface
so tight
not even her shoulders
You saw it before you could stop seeing it
stop seeing it, you will
never stop seeing it
just her face
eyes closed
they have to be, or the sky overhead
could no longer bear
