Pattern Detection

Scrolling through news photos
Across a few decades,
The weirdness of grieving

In public is striking—
Those mixtures of faces
At massive funerals

For slain leaders, martyrs
Of movements, or numbers
Of people killed at once

By sudden violence,
Human or natural,
Children especially.

Some postures are crumpled,
Some faces tragic masks,
Many running with tears,

As one would expect, but
There’s usually someone
With an odd, distant smile,

Or a conversation
Being held to one side.
Some folks just look puzzled

Or bored, or distracted—
A feature more noted
Of the crowds in lynching

Photographs or public
Executions. In those
Cases, it’s considered

A creepy sign of just
How casually the lives
Of the killed are being

Taken from them, but what
Of the mass funerals?
Humans can’t sustain grief,

Guilt, or even horror
Smoothly for very long
In a social setting?

A mob’s made of iron
Filings well-magnetized,
But scrutinize filings.

A few you’ll always find
Are skew-whiff, wandering.
There’s vast, invisible

Power in all patterns—
Every pattern’s borders
Lie within that pattern.