Wednesday poem: Chemistry Anonymous, Claire Burch

CHEMISTRY ANONYMOUS

The chemistry of war is hard to know. 

Mysterious. I never saw it grow. 

I only saw its dark results one morning, 

there is a lot to learn

I am learning

The chemistry of war makes fun of others, 

it curls white tired lips and shouts dry anger

to the small chemistry of low and hunger

and the mock turtle fiction that men are brothers.

"Nothing is lost but that it shall be found, nothing is crumpled but that it shall rise." 

All false. 

Go find small comfort in the ground

or in a greater chemistry! He dies 

who does not whisper laughter and does not see, 

and has no hands to touch, no feet to walk. 

There is no mystery but that of wrong

on the long shadowed beaches 

of the young. 

Claire Burch

published in Poetry in July 1946