by Radice Lebewsu

With reason, guides have praised its beauty and its treasured gifts,
blue waters, green ravines, and blinding landscaped drops and lifts.
Alas, barbarian-destroying hermocopides
are using missiles on the architecture of Kyiv.
Now scenes of devastation follow streets with spitefulness,
tanks, drunk with power, roll into the city’s frightful mess.
And in the eve of night upon this very anguished hour,
old chestnut trees without their leaves are languishing and dour.  
The rubble and the fires have left a horrid string of scars,
yet still it stands, though overcast and emptying of cars.

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(Radice Lebewsu is Bruce Dale Wise, who’s appeared at New Pop Lit in the past at our Special Projects blog, as part of our “Fun Pop Poetry” feature.)