I am haunted everytime I read the following poem. Goes to show life is just a pit of sorrow. by Bruce Weigl. Song of Napalm For my Wife After the storm, after the rain stopped pounding, We stood in the doorway watching horses Walk off lazily across the pasture's hill. We stared through the black screen, Our vision altered by the distance So I thought I saw a mist Kicked up around their hooves when they faded Like cut-out horses Away from us. The grass was never more blue in that light, more Scarlet; beyond the pasture Trees scraped their voices into the wind, branches Criss-crossed the sky like barbed wire But you said they were only branches. Okay. The storm stopped pounding. I am trying to say this straight: for once I was sane enough to pause and breathe Outside my wild plans and after the hard rain I turned my back on the old curses. I believed They swung finally away from me . . . But still the branches are wire And thunder is the pounding mortar, Still I close my eyes and see the girl Running from her village, napalm Stuck to her dress like jelly, Her hands reaching for the no one Who waits in waves of heat before her. So I can keep on living, So I can stay here beside you, I try to imagine she runs down the road and wings Beat inside her until she rises Above the stinking jungle and her pain Eases, and your pain, and mine. But the lie swings back again. The lie works only as long as it takes to speak And the girl runs only as far As the napalm allows Until her burning tendons and crackling Muscles draw her up Into that final position Burning bodies so perfectly assume. Nothing Can change that, she is burned behind my eyes And not your good love and not the rain-swept air And not the jungle green Pasture unfolding before us can deny it. ------------ Please reread it:) mG.