"Apostrophe to Man"

For some reason, this Edna St. Vincent Millay poem is on my mind.
(This photo is of her gravesite at Steepletop Cemetery in Austerlitz, New York.)

Apostrophe To Man

(on reflecting that the world is ready to go to war again)

Detestable race, continue to expunge yourself, die out.
Breed faster, crowd, encroach, sing hymns, build bombing airplanes;
Make speeches, unveil statues, issue bonds, parade;
Convert again into explosives the bewildered ammonia and the distracted cellulose;
Convert again into putrescent matter drawing flies
The hopeful bodies of the young; exhort,
Pray, pull long faces, be earnest, be all but overcome, be photographed;
Confer, perfect your formulae, commercialize
Bacateria harmful to human tissue,
Put death on the market;
Breed, crowd, encroach, expand, expunge yourself, die out,
Homo called sapiens.


I guess my student Matt is right: I should prepare and teach a seminar on Millay.