Bernard Page 3
 

Old Romeo,
who never scored,
Lottery Lena,
who never won,

Tony of the races,
horses running through his dreams,
bitter Maureen,
with her heart in her clutch.

And others too,
sick of TV and web,
come here in the evening
and listen with strange smiles:

there is no love
and there is no hope
and there is no joy
outside Café Kabul.

 At Café Kabul,
there is laughter all night,
and the music drowns out
the darkness of the stars.

On the Day of Your Birth Your Death
Was Born

On the day of your birth your death was born,
full-armed, like Athena,
and it started its journey,
endlessly circuitous, treacherous, oblique,
or direct as a hawk from a cold, blue sky.

It is coming
across valley and mountain, desert and jungle,
tundra and ice floe, forest and ocean,
countries and cities ransacked by war,
devoured by plague, in endless battle