“The seventh column”

Once again Diderot’s beautiful ruin stands

in the corner of my mind,

the great book-city he described in Les Bijoux Indiscrets.

It stands there with its cupola and wings and spires;

the vast cranes that have been thrown up over the roofs,

the towers of every color and shape, like laments;

the wide-open windows that look out across the city’s view:

and here a rich man’s palace, there a poor man’s hovel,

and everywhere the same old poverty and misery.

The sun shines on Diderot’s ruin, but it is not enough to warm

the air. It glares on the golden spires and cupolas,

and melts the stone and marble into liquid gold.

The shadows lie across the dusty streets like a veil of fire;

the scorched pavement is strewn with broken glass,

with splinters of wood and bits of plaster; the dead leaves rustle,

and amid that universal silence one hears the distant hum

of a city in pain.