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Pompeii

By Charles Bernstein

The rich men, they know about suffering

That comes from natural things, the fate that

Rich men say they can’t control, the swell of

The tides, the erosion of polar caps

And the eruption of a terrible

Greed among those who cease to be content

With what they lack when faced with wealth they are

Too ignorant to understand. Such wealth

Is the price of progress. The fishmonger

Sees the dread on the faces of the trout

And mackerel laid out at the market

Stall on quickly melting ice. In Pompeii

The lava flowed and buried the people

So poems such as this could be born.

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Response: October 2008, page 6 · October 2008, page 7

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