This poem was inspired by the citizens of Lviv, Ukraine wrapping their historic statues for safekeeping.

 

Watch the love in their bare hands

As they shield Adonis with the plastic sheeting

Wrapping him with the care of a parent swaddling

A newborn, to protect him from the shelling,

The random blasts that could shatter everything they have.

Thinking of the dangers to their own flesh,

The civilians climb the stone to save

The god who was born mortal, like themselves,

His beauty unprepared for the shocks

That have already hollowed other squares

With a wrath inhuman and unlimited,

Breaking the heart but not the soul.

These men and women know what they must do

Despite the cold and hunger and fear

For their own children who gaze out of windows below.

They lift themselves high

To shroud the glory

That has watched over them for centuries,

To cover the eyes that must not see

The assault upon the light.