City Psalm
by Denise Levertov
The killings continue, each second pain and misfortune extend themselves in the genetic chain, injustice is done knowingly, and the air bears the dust of decayed hopes, yet breathing those fumes, walking the thronged pavements among crippled lives, jackhammers raging, a parking lot painfully agleam in the May sun, I have seen not behind but within, within the dull grief, blown grit, hideous concrete facades, another grief, a gleam as of dew, an abode of mercy, have heard not behind but within noise a humming that drifted into a quiet smile. Nothing was changed, all was revealed otherwise; not that horror was not, not that killings did not continue, but that as if transparent all disclosed an otherness that was blessed, that was bliss. I saw Paradise in the dust of the street.
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Peace, dwight
“…Paradise in the Dust of the Street” Denise Levertov
