June 13, 2016

Wooden Boat of Silence by Martin Willitts Jr.

at the far end of life
there is an irresistible wooden boat
in a thunderstorm of pitiless clouds
drawing nearer
silent as black swans
from a place where time does not matter
leaves on shoreline trees shudder

in this world
the rich and poor are equal

it is long enough in time to forget Belsen
where furnaces ran day and night
or the peat bogs
where people were sacrificed to silent gods

the boat does not judge the passenger
whether they were quarrelsome or agreeable

they all head where memory had no questions

thousands and thousands of sand cranes
rise and land in the same spot perfectly
in spears of light torching the world

it is too late to ask
what does it all mean







Martin Willitts Jr is a retired Librarian. His poems appeared in Blue Fifth, Centrifugal Eye, Stone Canoe, Kentucky Review, Poppy Road Review, and many others. He has 11 full-length collections including "How to Be Silent" (FutureCycle Press, 2016) and forthcoming "Dylan Thomas and the Writer Shed" (FutureCycle Press, 2017).

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