A poem by Kenneth Patchen and with a photo by me

"O Howling Cells"

I protest against the manner of these ruins.
That their streets are soft with the dried hair
Of murdered children is not outside
The order of our speckled activity; even
The here recorded delight of the citizenry
In self-mutilation and impious sport,
Involving the real nature of human desires,
Can be condoned without loss to our earthly intent:
But that these very rocks and caked walls
Vomit a deeper evil; that this sorrowful wood
And impenetrable stone are witness
To unimaginable hells; and that not survivor
--Unless we except the insane--can share
The full horror of man's cruelty to the things
He could not kill; this cannot be forgiven.

(from Collected Poems; New Directions 1968; NDP 284)