"there's a war outside still raging / you say it ain't ours anymore to win"

For Poetry Monday, a hat tip to mme_hardy:


"After great pain, a formal feeling comes," Emily Dickinson

After great pain, a formal feeling comes –
The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs –
The stiff Heart questions ‘was it He, that bore,’
And ‘Yesterday, or Centuries before’?

The Feet, mechanical, go round –
A Wooden way
Of Ground, or Air, or Ought –
Regardless grown,
A Quartz contentment, like a stone –

This is the Hour of Lead –
Remembered, if outlived,
As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow –
First – Chill – then Stupor – then the letting go –


---L.

Subject quote from "No Surrender," Bruce Springsteen.