KNOCKING

Like a member of the secret police conscience

Enjoys waking you at three in the morning

When you're confused and likely to blurt out

The very things you meant to keep secret

So it was with me; there was barely time

To slip out the back as the front door shook.

No time to dress; I ran through Lvov

With a confusion of rags and tatters and dreams

Running alongside, urging me in shrill voices

To seek shelter in a barrel or an alley

Or in dark corner of an imagined church

Painted by the crook’d shade of Pieter Saanredam.