Weldon Kees

Here you will find the Poem Year's End of poet Weldon Kees

Year's End

The state cracked where they left your breath
No longer instrument. Along the shore
The sand ripped up, and the newer blood
Streaked like a vein to every monument.
The empty smoke that drifted near the guns
Where the stiff motor pounded in the mud
Had the smell of a hundred burned-out suns.
The ceiling of your sky went dark.
A year ago today they cracked your bones.

So rot in a closet in the ground
For the bad trumpets and the capitol's
Long seasonable grief. Rot for its guests,
Alive, that step away from death. Yet you,
A year cold, come more living to this room
Than these intruders, vertical and warm.