Alice's Submission for Monday, April 16

Iron Curtain

by Alfred Gong

The other side is a mirror of ours:
The same birches and the same night.
Strange: the moon
shines large and waits on that side....
People over there--I knew some, once,
when the other side was not yet another side--
speak the same language;
but they are silent now
and we are silent too.
A different silence.

We, here on guard
in this night under the birches,
we do not talk even to each other.
We are all ears, intent
to catch the pounding of the hearts
of those who [I don't know why] want to cross over,
over to the side
where the moon shines large and waits.

Such a night is good for quiet dreams,
limbs in the grass, eyes in the garden of stars,
yes, a night to hold a girl close
and not this cold gun.
Strange.
Strange the dew in moonlight
on buds of barbed wire....

--Listen!...Did you hear it too?
--Who would dare in the full moon--
It's only the wind, playful in the birch boughs,
maybe a creature of the night,
a bird, fluttering from its dreams.
The wind a creature of night....

Too late we noticed the fugitives:
running on the other side
in a shower of clear silver light.
And stood still.
Arms wide open, resembling two crosses,
and looked around once more
before they sank against each other,
and later into the dew.

How strange, strange.
You feel like firing your rounds at the moon
and silently going home.