The house has been bombed. Everyone dead:
The kids, the parents, the toys, the actors on TV,
characters in novels, personas in poetry collections,
the I, the he and the she. No pronouns left. Not even
for the kids when they learn parts of speech
next year. Shrapnel flies in the dark,
looks for the family’s peals of
laughter hiding behind piles of disfigured
walls and bleeding picture frames. The radio
no longer speaks. Its batteries have burnt,
the antenna is broken.
Even the broadcaster felt the pain when the radio
was hit. Even we, hearing the bomb
as it fell, threw ourselves
to the ground,
each of us counting the others around them.
We were safe, but our hearts
still ache.
