Seismograph

THE earth twitches its skin
Like a goaded elephant
And jars the electric pin
Which measures the irritant.
This is the pain recorder
Of the terrestrial ache
And sea disorder
By which men take
Heed of pressure points
By volcanic fountains,
And listen to creaking joints
In the fevered mountains.
It records earth’s wounds
But never the patter
Of marching feet, nor sounds
Of iron throats that scatter
Hate on her crust.
Four horsemen who caper
In the horizon’s red dust
Make no hoof prints on paper
Of the earth-geared drum,
No more than the deer
That plunges from
The scent of fear.