evening news

By Hans Magnus Enzensberger
Translated by Peter Lach-Newinsky

massacres for a handful of rice,
I hear, for everyone every day
a handful of rice: drumfire
on thin huts, indistinctly
I hear it, over dinner

on the glazed tiles
I hear rice grains dancing,
a handful, over dinner,
rice grains on my roof:
the first march rain, distinctly.