Evening Meal in the Twentieth Century
How is it I can eat bread here and cut meat ,
And in quiet shake salt, speak of the meal,
Pour water, serve my son’s small plate?
Here now I love too well my wife’s gold hair combed,
Her voice, her violin, our books on shelves in another room,
The tall chest shining darkly in supper-light.
I have read tonight
The sudden meaningless foreign violent death
Of a great man we both loved, hope
For a country not ours killed. But blacker than print:
For his million people no house now. For me
A new hurt to the old health of the heart once more:
That sore, that heavy, that dull and I think now incurable
Pain:
Seeing love hated, seeing real death,
Knowing evil alive I was taught was conquered.
How shall I cut this bread gladly, unless more share
The day’s meals I earn?
Or offer my wife this meat from our fire, our fortune?
It should not have taken me so long to learn.
But how can I speak aloud at my own table tonight
And not curse my own food, not cry out death,
And not frighten my young son?
And in quiet shake salt, speak of the meal,
Pour water, serve my son’s small plate?
Here now I love too well my wife’s gold hair combed,
Her voice, her violin, our books on shelves in another room,
The tall chest shining darkly in supper-light.
I have read tonight
The sudden meaningless foreign violent death
Of a great man we both loved, hope
For a country not ours killed. But blacker than print:
For his million people no house now. For me
A new hurt to the old health of the heart once more:
That sore, that heavy, that dull and I think now incurable
Pain:
Seeing love hated, seeing real death,
Knowing evil alive I was taught was conquered.
How shall I cut this bread gladly, unless more share
The day’s meals I earn?
Or offer my wife this meat from our fire, our fortune?
It should not have taken me so long to learn.
But how can I speak aloud at my own table tonight
And not curse my own food, not cry out death,
And not frighten my young son?