New and Selected Poems (16 page)

I have. At the funeral
Pulling down her skirt to cover her knees
While inadvertently
Showing us her cleavage
Down to the tip of her nipples.

 

A complete stranger, wobbly on her heels,
Negotiating the exit
With the assembled mourners
Eyeing her rear end
With visible interest.

 

Presidential hopefuls
Will continue to lie to the people
As we sit here bowed.

 

New hatreds will sweep the globe
Faster than the weather.
Sewer rats will sniff around
Lit cash machines
While we sigh over the departed.

 

And her beauty will live on, no matter
What any one of these black-clad,
Grim veterans of every wake,
Every prison gate and crucifixion,
Sputters about her discourtesy.

 

Miss Jones, you'll be safe
With the insomniacs. You'll triumph
Where they pour wine from a bottle
Wrapped in a white napkin,
Eat sausage with pan-fried potatoes,
And grow misty-eyed remembering

 

The way you walked past the open coffin,
Past the stiff with his nose in the air
Taking his long siesta.
A cute little number, an old man said,
But who was she?
Miss Jones, the guest book proclaimed.

Madame Gabrielle, were you really French?
And what were those heavy books
You made them balance on top of their heads,
Young women with secret aspirations,
We saw strolling past the row of windows
In the large room above Guido's barbershop?

 

On the same floor was the office of an obscure
Weekly preaching bloody revolution.
Men with raised collars and roving eyes
Wandered in and out. When they conspired
They spat and pulled down the yellow shades,
Not to raise them or open the windows again

 

Until the summer heat came and your students
Wore dresses with their shoulders bared
As they promenaded with books on their heads,
And the bald customer in the barbershop
Sat sweating while overseeing in the mirror
His three remaining hairs being combed.

It's Mr. Brown looking much better
Than he did in the morgue.
He's brought me a huge carp
In a bloodstained newspaper.
What an odd visit.
I haven't thought of him in years.

 

Linda is with him and so is Sue.
Two pale and elegant fading memories
Holding each other by the hand.
Even their lipstick is fresh
Despite all the scientific proofs
To the contrary.

 

Is Linda going to cook the fish?
She turns and gazes in the direction
Of the kitchen while Sue
Continues to watch me mournfully.
I don't believe any of it,
And still I'm scared stiff.

 

I know of no way to respond,
So I do nothing.
The windows are open. The air's thick
With the scent of magnolias.
Drops of evening rain are dripping
From the dark and heavy leaves.
I take a deep breath; I close my eyes.

 

Dear specters, I don't even believe
You are here, so how is it
You're making me comprehend
Things I would rather not know just yet?

 

It's the way you stare past me
At what must already be my own ghost,
Before taking your leave,
As unexpectedly as you came in,
Without one of us breaking the silence.

My chicken soup thickened with pounded young almonds
My blend of winter greens.
Dearest tagliatelle with mushrooms, fennel, anchovies,
Tomatoes and vermouth sauce.

 

Beloved monkfish braised with onions, capers
And green olives.
Give me your tongue tasting of white beans and garlic,
Sexy little assortment of formaggi and frutta!
I want to drown with you in red wine like a pear,
Then sleep in a macédoine of wild berries with cream.

The wives of my friends
Have the air
Of having shared a secret.
Their eyes are lowered
But when we ask them
What for
They only glance at each other
And smile,
Which only increases our desire
To know . . .

 

Something they did
Long ago,
Heedless of the consequences,
That left
Such a lingering sweetness?

 

Is that the explanation
For the way
They rest their chins
In the palms of their hands,
Their eyes closed
In the summer heat?

 

Come tell us,
Or give us a hint.
Trace a word or just a single letter
In the wine
Spilled on the table.

 

No reply. Both of them
Lovey-dovey
With the waning sunlight
And the evening breeze
On their faces.

 

The husbands drinking
And saying nothing,
Dazed and mystified as they are
By their wives' power
To give
And take away happiness,
As if their heads
Were crawling with snakes.

A house with a screened-in porch
On the road to nowhere.
The missus topless because of the heat,
A bag of Frito Banditos in her lap.
President Bush on TV
Watching her every bite.

 

Poor reception, that's the one
Advantage we have here,
I said to the mutt lying at my feet
And sighing in sympathy.
On another channel the preacher
Came chaperoned by his ghost
When he shut his eyes full of tears
To pray for dollars.

 

“Bring me another beer,” I said to her ladyship,
And when she wouldn't oblige,
I went out to make chamber music
Against the sunflowers in the yard.

Yellow feathers,
Is it true
You chirp to the cop
On the beat?

 

Desist. Turn your
Nervous gaze
At the open bathroom door
Where I'm soaping

 

My love's back
And putting my chin on her shoulder
So I can do the same for her
Breasts and crotch.

 

Sing. Flutter your wings
As if you were applauding,
Or I'll drape her black slip
Over your gilded cage.

Evenings, they ran their bloody feet
Over the pages of my schoolbooks.
With eyes closed, I can still hear
The trees on our street
Saying a moody farewell to summer,

 

And someone, under our window, recalling
The silly old cows hesitating,
Growing suddenly suspicious
Just as the blade drops down on them.

It looks so dark the end of the world may be near.
I believe it's going to rain.
The birds in the park are silent.
Nothing is what it seems to be,
Nor are we.

 

There's a tree on our street so big
We can all hide in its leaves.
We won't need any clothes either.
I feel as old as a cockroach, you said.
In my head, I'm a passenger on a ghost ship.

 

Not even a sigh outdoors now.
If a child was left on our doorstep,
It must be asleep.
Everything is teetering on the edge of everything
With a polite smile.

 

It's because there are things in this world
That just can't be helped, you said.
Right then, I heard the blood orange
Roll off the table and with a thud
Lie cracked open on the floor.

That same light by which I saw her last
Made me close my eyes now in revery,
Remembering how she sat in the garden

 

With a red shawl over her shoulders
And a small book in her lap,
Once in a long while looking up

 

With the day's brightness on her face,
As if to appraise something of utmost seriousness
She has just read at least twice,

 

With the sky clear and open to view,
Because the leaves had already fallen
And lay still around her two feet.

A few couples walk off into the dark.
In the spot where they vanished,
The trees are swaying as if in a storm
Without making the slightest sound.
The train, too, sits still in the station.

 

I remember a friend telling me once
How he woke up in a long train
Put out of service in a railroad yard.
In the dining car the tables were all set
With wine glasses and fresh flowers,
And the moon's white glove on one of them.

 

Here, there's nothing but night and darkness.
In the empty coach, far in the back,
I think I can see one shadowy passenger
Raising his pale hand to wave to me,
Or to peer at the watch on his wrist
I suspect has stopped running years ago.

The blue trees are arguing with the red wind.

 

The white mare has a peacock for a servant.

 

The hawk brings the night in its claws.

 

The golden mountain doesn't exist.

 

The golden mountain touches the black sky.

Are you the sole owner of a seedy nightclub?

 

Are you its sole customer, sole bartender,
Sole waiter prowling around the empty tables?

 

Do you put on wee-hour girlie shows
With dead stars of black-and-white films?

 

Is your office upstairs over the neon lights,
Or down deep in the dank rat cellar?

 

Are bearded Russian thinkers your silent partners?
Do you have a doorman by the name of Dostoyevsky?

 

Is Fu Manchu coming tonight?
Is Miss Emily Dickinson?

 

Do you happen to have an immortal soul?
Do you have a sneaky suspicion that you have none?

 

Is that why you throw a white pair of dice,
In the dark, long after the joint closes?

A message for you,
Piece of shit:

 

You double-crossed us.
You were supposed to
Get yourself crucified
For the sake of the Truth . . .

 

Who? Me?

 

The smallest bread crumb
Thankfully overlooked on the dinner table.
A born coward.
A perfect nobody.

 

And now this!

 

In the windowpane,
My mouth gutted open.
Aghast.
My judges all wearing black hoods.

 

It must be a joke.
A big misunderstanding, fellows.
A wrong number, surely?
Someone else's dark night of the soul.

The truth is dark under your eyelids.
What are you going to do about it?
The birds are silent; there's no one to ask.
All day long you'll squint at the gray sky.
When the wind blows you'll shiver like straw.

 

A meek little lamb, you grew your wool
Till they came after you with huge shears.
Flies hovered over your open mouth,
Then they, too, flew off like the leaves,
The bare branches reached after them in vain.

 

Winter coming. Like the last heroic soldier
Of a defeated army, you'll stay at your post,
Head bared to the first snowflake.
Till a neighbor comes to yell at you,
You're crazier than the weather, Charlie.

Wears a smirk on his face.
Sits in a wheelchair.
A black cigarillo in one hand,
A live fly in the other.

 

Hey, sweet mama, he shouts.
I'm wearing my paper crown today
And my wraparound shades
Just for you!

 

The Garden of Eden parking lot
Needs weeding,
And the candy store
Is now padlocked.

 

On the street of Elvis look-alikes,
I saw the Klan Wizard in his robes.
I saw the panhandling Jesus
And heard the wind-chime in his head.

 

•

 

It's live horror-movie time,
Says the Emperor,
A can of bug spray in his hand.
He lets my frail mother
Help him cross the street.

 

She's charmed by his manner and exclaims:
“Such a nice boy!”
Even with his empty eye sockets
And his amputated legs.

 

•

 

When midnight comes—
Commands the Emperor—
Put a mike up to the first roach
Crawling up the kitchen wall.

 

Let's hear about their exotic dancers,
Their tuxedos-for-rent places,
And see if their witch trials
Are just like the ones we have.