Couplings buckled, cracked, collapsed, And all reared, wheels and steel Pawing and leaping above the plain, And fell down totally, a crash Deep in the rising surf of dust, As temples into their cellars crash. Dust flattened across the silence That follows the end of anything, Drifted into cracks of wreckage. But motion remained, a girder Found gravity and shifted, a wheel Turned lazily, turning, turning, And life remained, at work to Detain spirit: three lions, one Male with wide masculine mane, Two female, short, strong, emerged And looked quickly over the ruin, Turned and moved toward the hills. Used with the permission of Copper Canyon Press, P.O. Box 271, Port Townsend, WA 98368-0271, www.cc.press.org | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE MAN WITH THE WOODEN LEG by KATHERINE MANSFIELD THE PHOSPHORESCENT MAN by KAREN SWENSON SONNET ON FAME (2) by JOHN KEATS THE BELLS OF LYNN; HEARD AT NAHANT by HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW JUDGE NOT by ADELAIDE ANNE PROCTER ODES I, 38. AD MINISTRAM by QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUS |