The Asians Dying

W. S. MerwinW. S. Merwin

1 min read · 12.5K reads

When the forests have been destroyed their darkness remains
The ash the great walker follows the possessors
Forever
Nothing they will come to is real
Nor for long
Over the watercourses
Like ducks in the time of the ducks
The ghosts of the villages trail in the sky
Making a new twilightRain falls into the open eyes of the dead
Again again with its pointless sound
When the moon finds them they are the color of everythingThe nights disappear like bruises but nothing is healed
The dead go away like bruises
The blood vanishes into the poisoned farmlands
Pain the horizon
Remains
Overhead the seasons rock
They are paper bells
Calling to nothing livingThe possessors move everywhere under Death their star
Like columns of smoke they advance into the shadows
Like thin flames with no light
They with no past
And fire their only future
W. S. Merwin
About the poet

W. S. Merwin

1927 - Present/AmericanWilliam Stanley Merwin is an American poet. During the 1960s anti-war movement, Merwin's unique craft was thematically characterized by indirect, unpunctuated narration. In the 80s and 90s, Merwin's writing influence derived from his in…

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