Compelled by calamity's magnet
They loiter and stare as if the house
Burnt-out were theirs, or as if they thought
Some scandal might any minute ooze
From a smoke-choked closet into light;
No deaths, no prodigious injuries
Glut these hunters after an old meat,
Blood-spoor of the austere tragedies.
Mother Medea in a green smock
Moves humbly as any housewife through
Her ruined apartments, taking stock
Of charred shoes, the sodden upholstery:
Cheated of the pyre and the rack,
The crowd sucks her last tear and turns away.
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Comments
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"austere tragedies," is a pairing of two of my all time favorite words. Tragedies draw people in, not always for the good of helping those in need but because the human eye longs to witness the pain of others.
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This is so true. Why do people clog the roads and wait for their turn to gape at car accidents?
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Nice to know that even then tragedy drew people in like maggots to dead meat. If she only knew how her words would touch deep cores of women years later I think she would close the books and say run don't read run.. And hide..Catressa
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