Futility

Always just one demon in the attic.
Always just one death in the village. And the dogs
howling in that direction. And from the other end
the new-born child arrives, the only one
to fill the empty space in that wide air.

Likewise also cells infected by a virus
send out a signal all around them and defences
are mobilised so that no other virus

Such pejorative deformities of sound
Without meaningful speech or musical equipoise,
Annoyances none but hoi polloi enjoys,
Through our winding whispering galleries resound
Unwelcome, & like a tedious siege surround
Us with that ubiquitous nuisance, noise,
Which may take the shape of inflated reputation,
Able neither to stun, astonish nor astound
Those whom obscene publicity annoys,
Who prefer the decent obscurity of publication.

&

Regardless of the weird world’s disregard,
These works may be devoted to the wastebasket

1
Who will honor the city without a name
If so many are dead and others pan gold
Or sell arms in faraway countries?

What shepherd's horn swathed in the bark of birch
Will sound in the Ponary Hills the memory of the absent—
Vagabonds, Pathfinders, brethren of a dissolved lodge?

This spring, in a desert, beyond a campsite flagpole,

There is a face I know too well,
A face I dread to see,
So vain it is, so eloquent
Of all futility.

It is a human face that hides
A monkey soul within,
That bangs about, that beats a gong,
That makes a horrid din.