February rains
Cold fire on warm cities
Armies march
On empty fields
No sunflowers will grow
In the shell holes.
Next year.
March rains
Blood in the mud again
Generations of bones
Marching as one.
The inevitable ghost
Of the 20th century
Comes back to choke us
Blind our minds.
With ashen rain.
If we cannot learn
It never changes
No sunflowers will grow
In the East this year.
–Jack Blare