at last was moved
to tears
and then to various sheds,
many Manhattans away,
it looked like the end
of a movie,
made
reels of laughter
ago.
heightened by somber colors
of individual protest in public,
and TV-framed to fill the gaps
between commercials,
darker,
than all inflations
behind star-spangled
suits and stripes.
It made no cents
to lovers, deprived of art,
to the silent majority’s
dollar eyes,
glued to their sets
next door--
within spitting distance
of painted despair
over Guernica.*
“The bombing is considered one of the first raids on a defenseless civilian population by a modern air force."
If you are interested in publishing or adapting this copyrighted poem by setting it to music, staging or filming it, etc., please contact the author.