THE SKY

The sky plays with paints
among the rainbow spell

offering us shade
by the poplar trees

we sit on a bench
under a tree of life

my Polish friend and poet
reminisces about his past

those dark Hitlerian days
of a tiresome occupation

as tall cries still linger
from the ghetto torched

the nights of Stalinist fears
as Warsaw neighbors whisper

begging over his peace songs
encircling an innocent youth

with fetters and red feathers
on May Day's long parades

yet here we are eyeing birds
in Central Park

watching a late marathon
by the river beds

munching on a green apple
as thunder's rain drips down

as shadows of Autumn echo
from cloudy brown acorns

cover the branches swing
near the lights of hills

an adolescent is dying
of a chattering laughter

and a playwright
loses at backgammon.