The Orange Bears (Kenneth Patchen)

And I quote: "I remember you would put daisies/On the windowsill at night and in/The morning they'd be so covered with soot/You couldn't tell what they were anymore./A hell of a fat chance my orange bears had!"

Okay, so maybe that line doesn't make much sense without reading Kenneth Patchen's poem, but you should, because it's all contained in that line, those last two stanzas.

The poem starts so nicely. It begins like any poem about Nature. But then it turns and we learn that the bears don't win. And that daises lose to soot. Which expands to the nearby strikers who lose out to the ones with bayonets.

Everything is contained by the same threads. It's the same portal, only expanded from dust to mammals to people throughout history fighting for their rights.

Not bad for a poem that from its title and opening lines could have been a nature travelogue.

Favorite line: "What did he know about/Orange bears with their coats all stunk up with soft coal/And the National Guard coming over"