Classic Poem

O bright bomb & circumstance
of intercontinental thermonuclear
up-roar

O what hallelujah of hogs & warships
in the general atmosphere
that downpour day

It is the gross national intercontinental
thermodiplomatic EXEMPLUM
hoo raw

in the which atomic context
talk is cheap
& poems not worth much

But O bright bomb & circumstance
O bride of foreordained tomorrow mornings
& metaphoric mushroom in the blind atomic pilgrimage

Machine language of angels
from zenith to ground
zero

& gross national witness
was there in 1962
during Operation DOMINIC

in the Pacific
around Johnston Island
was there & witnessed

four nuclear explosions
two at midnight & two at dawn
& all four most bloody beautiful

& talk
alas
is cheap

& so