Again

　　Norman Dubie

　　I’d left Paris for the beaches

　　in Spain. I’d sold

　　my dead father’s farm

　　and, in shame,

　　bought it back again

　　at a great loss . . . then

　　a plough(犁) found

　　a shelf of bismuth(鉍)

　　and I sold just the north pasture(牧草)

　　for big serial profits

　　and I am ashamed again:

　　the huge white bones of my father’s

　　favorite cow exposed

　　one late September morning!

　　It’s always been potatoes and bread

　　or millions of francs(法郎) on speculation.

　　I am not stupid. I’m not dead.

　　But the bones of an old cow assemble

　　repeatedly now in a dream

　　where my naked lame(跛足的) father

　　sits in a tub of boiling milk

　　and screams at me

　　first my name and then his name

　　which is the same

　　name. The crimes of the verb to be

　　pushing a hard rain in general

　　across the city and its suburbs. . . .