Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Driving Home, by Charles Simic, new poet laureate
A poem by our new poet laureate, from the August 20 New Yorker, and with thanks to Steve Rogers.DRIVING HOME
Minister of our coming doom, preaching
On the car radio, how right
Your Hell and damnation sound to me
As I travel these small, bleak roads
Thinking of the mailman's son
The Army sent back in a sealed coffin.
His house is around the next turn.
a forlorn mutt sits in the yard
Waiting for someone to come home.
I can see the TV is on in the living room,
Canned laughter in the empty house
Like the sound of beer cans tied to a hearse.
-- Charles Simic
