Kenneth Rexroth

Between Two Wars

1944

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/between-two-wars/

Remember that breakfast one November —

Cold black grapes smelling faintly

Of the cork they were packed in,

Hard rolls with hot, white flesh,

And thick, honey sweetened chocolate?

And the parties at night; the gin and the tangos?

The torn hair nets, the lost cuff links?

Where have they all gone to,

The beautiful girls, the abandoned hours?

They said we were lost, mad and immoral,

And interfered with the plans of the management.

And today, millions and millions, shut alive

In the coffins of circumstance,

Beat on the buried lids,

Huddle in the cellars of ruins, and quarrel

Over their own fragmented flesh.