William Heyen – Ⅶ
The Fish
A heavy-headed fish swims through history
in the depths of Bergen-Belsen & Dresden
& the Balkans & under African dirt at Darfur beneath
Nanjing & Wounded Knee & Troy
its gills keep sifting as it swims the ditch at My Lai
nor does it not never persist swimming among
roots of trees where slaves were tortured & hanged
& there it is at Babi Yar & there in Europe again
beneath the ancient Roman Colleseum it seems God
empowers it to be everywhere at once a swimming
stasis within continuum even beneath Jerusalem.
But, every night, it returns to its cave in Hiroshima.
It rests there. It does not consolidate wisdom or doctrine
about where in hell on earth it has been.
It rests, it hears & heeds God, who knows. It swims out again.
A heavy-headed fish swims through history
in the depths of Bergen-Belsen & Dresden
& the Balkans & under African dirt at Darfur beneath
Nanjing & Wounded Knee & Troy
its gills keep sifting as it swims the ditch at My Lai
nor does it not never persist swimming among
roots of trees where slaves were tortured & hanged
& there it is at Babi Yar & there in Europe again
beneath the ancient Roman Colleseum it seems God
empowers it to be everywhere at once a swimming
stasis within continuum even beneath Jerusalem.
But, every night, it returns to its cave in Hiroshima.
It rests there. It does not consolidate wisdom or doctrine
about where in hell on earth it has been.
It rests, it hears & heeds God, who knows. It swims out again.
