Some Children

would only sleep with the windows
wide open, as if lying under the stars
or out in the street,
                                    couldn’t settle except
with a breeze coming in (occasional
hailstones, stray bullet-fire, bricks)

were afraid they’d lose part of themselves
in the black-out
                            so they lay there alert
for the sound of the adults safely back
from the dark, for the hooves of the horses

that leapt from the paintings downstairs
to roam with the foxes and night birds,
all the souls who’d been turned into trees.

Every infant kept vigil, awake
...