From The Pile

"over here is one with a Bach cello piece in her head. over there is one with blueprints for the next Auschwitz."

here’s a map
marking the moments
of monstrous evil

when people
floated down from fire
and through smoke
and rubble
landed—

when women and children
were herded into rooms
airtight, airless,
made to answer
for unreasoning hate,
hate the refrain
of all these places
and times
of monstrous evil

the collapsing
of buildings and of
innocence,
a world
suddenly larger
than we ever wanted

here’s a map
marking the moments—

the burning of young men,
some hung in trees,
made to answer
to monstrous bigots

bombs on buses,
suicide vests,
artillery in schoolyards,
random shooters,
screaming children—
dying to make
monsters happy

buildings fall
bodies burn
people fly

monstrous evil
monstrous evil

but this is all of us
we are good or evil
sometimes both

over here is one
with a Bach cello piece
in her head
over there is one
with blueprints
for the next Auschwitz

here’s the map
marking the moments
of monstrous evil

it unfolds
and asks:
will we be
one or the other?

— Rob Archer, September 11, 2021