Fressenstille

Starting with the top bricks

in July

and working downward

row by row

the sun had baked the building.

In August we moved slowly and barely

touched.

Then the power went out.

the dark street,

and the sparking

at our flanks,

unspeaking,

toward the square.

We found an Indian place with candles out and stopped there.

A man died, someone at the next table said. He was underground,

working on a transformer when it

exploded.

You know, said one of us after a while,

the Germans have a word for the quiet of animals eating.