Lisel Mueller

The Late News

For months, numbness
in the face of broadcasts;
I stick to my resolution
not to bleed
when my blood helps no one.

For months, I accept
my smooth skin,
my gratuitous life as my due;
then suddenly, a crack —
the truth seeps through like acid,
a child without eyes to weep with
weeps for me, and I bleed
as if I were still human.