news
George Bowering
Every day I add an inch
to the pile of old newspapers
in the closet.
In that three foot pile now
a dozen airliner crashes,
one earthquake in Alaska,
seventeen American soldiers
face down in Asian mud.
I could go on enumerating
like newsprint – we record
violent death & hockey scores
& keep the front room neat.
In front of me, on the table
my empty coffee cup, somewhat melted
butter, carbon copy of an old poem,
familiar things, nothing unexpected.
A plane could crash into the kitchen –
a fissure could jag the floor open –
some olive faced paratrooper bash
his rifle butt thru the window –
It would be news, somewhere.
Bowering, George. “News.” The Silver Wire. Kingston, ON: Quarry, 1966. 35.