Simon Anton Niño Diego Baena: Two Poems

Dispatch From a Bombed City 


In a café downtown 
an old man strokes his prayer beads 
the locals shovel snow
a mouse enters the wound 
of a dream 

In a country nobody can locate 
on the map, the birds 
migrate to the north 
with the ashes of trees on their wings

Yes, the world 
tastes bitter 
on the tongue

but here on the roof 
the cats 
are humping

--


Progress is now Made by the Number of Casualties


While digging 
the earth, you hear 

the murmur 
of the trees. And those who have

buried the dead 
will dig again.

Copyright 2022 Simon Anton Diego Baena

Simon Anton Niño Diego Baena is the author of the chapbook, The Magnum Opus Persists in the Evening (Jacar Press). His work has appeared in Poetry Daily, The Bitter Oleander, Osiris, and elsewhere. He currently lives in the Philippines with his wife Xandy.