blackened fields around the city
widen the night and something
flickers in the smokeless dark
twelve months of explosions
rocket glare rip saw mortars
and machine gun stutter make voices
that moved back and forth in shadows
hide from the bloody paths
they became by day
a city cracked and crumbling
buildings of exposed honeycomb
are silent and drained now
all bodies that didn’t leave
on their own became ash or
were dragged away and buried
so what still burns there?
not concrete or charred ruins
or bones nor stove
or warming fires
or candles of hope
I saw it on the evening news
something still glows at night
in Bakhmut
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