"Take them to the other side..."

With only his dim lantern
To tell him where he is
And every time a mountain
Of fresh corpses to load up

Take them to the other side
Where there are plenty more
I’d say by now he must be confused
As to which side is which

From "Charon's Cosmology" by Charles Simic. The complete poem is here.

Read Simic's latest post at the NYRB blog here. It's lovely.


Caron passant les ombres, Pierre Subleyras, 1735