by R.L. Greenfield
diana of wales died ten yrs ago.
she predicted she’d die young in a crash.
she felt her impending disappearance
from the radiant earth-----she was radiant
& attracted to the grand opposite.
she & dodi al-fayed departed together
in a sleek mercedes-benz.
i sat up all night watching cnn
as news & propaganda trickled in.
what does it mean?
‘nothing’ happened:
the car crashed & the watch began.
nobody entered the mercedes-benz
to lift diana out of the car.
the cops & photographers were transfixed.
they stared & stared & stared:
diana was alive alone & traumatized.
the world stood still at the end of the tunnel
in paris, france 31 august 1997.
the world watched diana pass over the border
into the great void.
& then everyone came out of the houses
to celebrate with songs & flowers & paintings
& graffiti: there was no stopping them.
the masses thundered over the lawns
& parking lots out into the streets of great britain.
they waved banners & pounded guitars
they drank bottled water or snorted coke
they sang love songs & read poems & kissed.
it was open mike time in the house of commons
the lords & ladies wept for their sins.
there was a mighty hurricane of guilt unleashed
as pupils prepared to go back to school
for the first day of classes of the fall term.
every student would be assigned to write
an essay: What The Moon Said The Night
Diana Of Wales Died.
R.L. Greenfield's poems have been published in many U.S. reviews & journals. A few of them are The Wallace Stevens Journal, The New York Quarterly, The Minnesota Review, The Wormwood Review & Poetry/LA. He received an NEA fellowship in literature in 1995 for a manuscript of poems. That year he founded a television series in Santa Barbara called The Greenfield Code devoted to literature & the creative act. A few of the program's guests have been the poets Eavan Boland, Wanda Coleman, & Shirley Lim-Geok. R.L. Greenfield often reads his poems in L.A. & thereabouts.