Foreign Song


To bomb them, 
we mustn’t have heard their music 
or known their waterless night watch,
we mustn’t have seen how already 
the desert was under constant death bells
ringing over sleeping cribs and dry wells.
We couldn’t have wanted 
this eavesdropping 
of names we’ve never pronounced 
praying themselves towards death.
I try to believe in us—
we must not 
have heard 
their music.