Charles Simic

Dance of the Macabre Mice

“In the land of turkeys in turkey weather” -W. Stevens

The president smiles to himself, he loves war
And another one is coming soon.
Each day we can feel the merriment mount
In government offices and TV studios
As our bombers fly off to distant countries.

The mortuaries are being scrubbed clean.
Soon they’ll be full of grim young men laid out in rows.
Already the crowd gurgles with delight
At the bird-sweet deceits, the deep-throated lies
About our coming battles and victories.

Dark-clad sharpshooters on rooftops
Are scanning the mall for suspicious pigeons,
Blind men waving their canes in the air,
Girls with short skirts and ample bosoms
Reaching deep into their purses for a lighter.

Listen

Everything about you,
My life, is both
Make-believe and real.
We are a couple
Working the night shift
In a bomb factory.

“Come quietly,” one says
To the other
As he takes her by the hand
And leads her
To a rooftop
Overlooking the city.

At this hour, if one listens
Long and hard,
One can hear a fire engine
In the distance,
But not the cries for help.

Just the silence
Growing deeper
At the sight of a small child
Leaping out of a window
With its nightclothes on fire.

Encyclopedia of Horror

Nobody reads it but the insomniacs.
How strange to find a child,
Slapped by his mother only this morning,
And the mad homeless woman
Who squatted to urinate in the street.

Perhaps they’ve missed something?
That smoke-shrouded city after a bombing raid,
The corpses like cigarette butts
In a dinner plate overflowing with ashes.
But no, everyone is here.

O were you to come, invisible tribunal,
There’d be too many images to thumb through,
Too many stories to listen to,
Like the one about guards playing cards
After they were done beating their prisoner.

Flying Horses

Neighbors leaned out of windows
To see a pretty girl pass by
While bombs fell out of the sky
And flames lit up the mirrors.

Our building was a roller coaster
We took a ride in every night
Wearing only our pajamas
And clutching a suitcase or a small dog.

It was like a street fair in hell.
Death had a shelf full of stuffed animals
At the shooting gallery
Where we were a row of ducklings

Marching in line with me tagging along,
Pulling a small toy truck by a string
While trying to make the sound of a motor
Rev up as it sits stuck in the mud.

The Lights are on Everywhere

The Emperor must not be told night is coming.
His armies are chasing shadows,
Arresting whip-poor-wills and hermit thrushes
And setting towns and villages on fire.

In the capital, they go around confiscating
Clocks and watches, burning heretics
And painting the sunrise above the rooftops
So we can wish each other good morning.

The rooster brought in chains is crowing.
The flowers in the garden have bee forced to stay open,
And still yet dark stains spread over the palace floors
Which no amount of scrubbing will wipe away.

Gourmets of Tragedies

The season of fabulous feasts is coming.
Mouthwatering dishes of new evils
Are on the way to your table,
Its choicest morsels artfully broiled,

Steamed, deviled and stir-fried,
Elegantly arranged to seduce the eye
With fresh herbs and truffles
On plates flanked with wine glasses.

Have you made your choice?
The waiter will whisper as he lights the candles.
It will be June or January.
The one you adore will wear black.

The sight of spirits being poured
Over a saucepan and catching fire
Will make her close her eyes in bliss.
The righteous love to kill for their faith.

About Charles Simic: Born in Belgrade in 1938, Charles Simic is the author of numerous books of poetry and prose. He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1990 for The World Doesn't End and held a MacArthur Foundation grant from 1984 to 1989. He is the winner of the Wallace Stevens Award and is the fifteenth poet laureate of the United States.