They're tipping their battered derbies and striding forward
    In step for a change, chipper, self-assured,
        Their cardboard suitcases labeled
Guest of Steerage. They've just arrived at the boot camp
    Of the good old French Foreign Legion
        Which they've chosen as their slice of life
Instead of drowning themselves. Once again
    They're about to become their own mothers and fathers
        And their own unknowable children
Who will rehearse sad laughter and mock tears,
    Will frown with completely unsuccessful
        Concentration, and will practice the amazement
Of suddenly understanding everything
    That baffles them and will go on baffling them
        While they pretend they're only one reel away
From belonging in the world. Their arrival
    Will mark a new beginning of meaningless
        Hostilities with a slaphappy ending. In a moment,
They'll hear music, and as if they'd known all along
    This was what they'd come for, they'll put down
        The mops and buckets given them as charms
With which to cleanse the Sahara and move their feet
    With a calm, sure, delicate disregard
        For all close-order drill and begin dancing.