Perspective

 

I’ve been seeing January migrations of geese in the powder blue sky above Dublin;

arrows sign-posting exotic, faraway countries.

Now a full-stop moves from the text into the blank margin of the page I’m reading;

I watch it moving upward, wondering where does it suppose it's travelling to;

at the top it turns right, making for the gorge between the two pages;

its slow progress suggesting rough terrain: clints and grykes, uneven pavements.

Just then, a newscaster’s voice cuts into the moment:

95 people dead on a street in Kabul;  

I lose sight of the full stop;

how high up must one be for our atrocities to be so small that they appear incomprehensible.