Reactors burn.
Clouds of ruinous dust
wander in the random winds.
We know the father’s sins
visited always on the children. Must
the final turn
of the irreversible screw
fix the coffin-lid down
over humanity just
in our late-flowering hour,
our children’s, their children’s opening day?
We too, we two,
are guilty with the rest, and like the rest
without power,
can only love and hope—and pray?
Well, perhaps loving hope’s a kind of prayer.
The unbelievable gift
of our late love should not be, cannot be
rejected or even made less perfect by
acknowledgement of our guilt,
apprehension of grief.
Our gratitude weighs no less than our care.