Classic Poem

I was wondering, did I write that I would get through this
by the sorrow of the path we will not take together? Or, saying,
My dearest love . . ., was I feeling sorry for us? Or, I wondered if
I hadn't made more than I should of this, saying, How terrible
this summer is! Had I asked you what becomes of the rest of your
birthdays if you leave this world?
Why can't I hide you under my long skirt? Why not, as they do in the movies?

Will they come thrashing and thumping at the gates?
As all of war's gates fling open, women
barricading all of war's gates. saying, Not here, he isn't here ,
shaking their heads, spilling out.
Why can't I hide you under my skirt? . . . A woman, hiding a man in her skirt, falls at a gun shot. The man gulps down the blood of the woman just losing her last breath. tearing out the stuff from a sofa, she makes a room to hide him. Gutting the piano, she hides his bed inside. The piano hits a mute key. Defiantly sitting atop a barrel, the woman shouting, he isn't here; I don't hide him . Chased to the farm shed, she lays herself over the man concealed under the straw heap: Not here; didn't hide him . They set the straws on fire.

In time to come, after I die,
how will my daughter recollect me?

Mother who tore apart
her brow and made a secret attic.
Unable to fall asleep because the night is too heavy,
Mother rising, putting on her glasses,
sleeptalking:
Not here; I didn't hide him.
A fig tree, its large palm
hiding the fruits that it bore without blossom,
stands in the rain,
shaking its head this way and that.