History Lesson Poem by Jennifer Juneau

An airtight night driving through Berlin late,
unsympathetic to time, your steely eyes chained
to the road like a mindless factory gate.
I no longer believed in the moon, but what remained
of the black and white prison
you once called home, the past that made you tick.
I strained to understand communism,
your years in the German Democratic Republic.

With a mouth full of flour, even the thickest voice
must tread light.
I loved you more the less I was your choice.

The mess of holes we discovered that night
leaked the plush lawns of my country, though I didn't have all.
And all it took to break down your wall.

(Yemassee Journal, Vol. XV, No.1, Fall 2007)