Another Gray Afternoon in Guernica

Not even the startling red of anguish
�pooling in the streets of the ancient
�market town, and not even the raw green
�silent screams of the women, and not the cerulean
�certainty of April skies capping the afternoon
�can ever pierce the gray reality.

�

Gray is the color of death dropping
�from the sky in early spring, and the last
�color left on the artist’s palette after the bombs
�have drained the world of warmer hues.

�

I can’t remember how many
�gray afternoons I spent in the
�very heart of Guernica on a bench
�in the museum on 53rd Street,
�not daring to breathe while wondering
�when the red would begin to flow
�from those wounds and wondering
�when it would finally stop.

�

�