Grey Century
–Éireann Lorsung
On the first grey morning of the grey century
spiders have put webs on the windows.

By the time you wake up the morning procedures
are going on. A tiny forest of cyclamens

in the backyard. You can’t say, Did I sleep
for a hundred years? You know that’s ludicrous.

The milkman looks at you funny.
The century wants you to enjoy the little plants

that flower in the shape of ghosts. It hates
to remind you everyone you used to love is dead.