Thinking For Berky

Thinking For Berky


In the late night listening from bed
I have joined the ambulance
or the patrol
screaming toward some drama,
the kind of end
that Berky must have some day,
if she isn't dead.

The wildest of all,
her father and mother cruel,
farming out there beyond
the old stone quarry
where highschool lovers parked
their lurching cars,
Berky learned to love
in that dark school.

Early her face was turned away
from home
toward any hardworking place;
but still her soul,
with terrible things to do, was alive,
looking out for the rescue that—surely,
some day—would have to come.

Windiest nights, Berky,
I have thought for you,
and no matter how lucky I've been
I've touched wood.
There are things not solved
in our town though tomorrow came:
there are things time passing
can never make come true.

We live in an occupied country,
misunderstood;
justice will take us millions
of intricate moves.
Sirens wil hunt down Berky,
you survivors in your beds
listening through the night,
so far and good.

—William Stafford

Posted over on News From Nowhere