Poem for Wednesday, August 19, 2009

Coming Down (continued)

IV.

Dreaming of Heidelberg, though I have never been

there--

 

            meine Lehrerin let me have a poster (seventeen-

years-old and counting) of the place several years ago

and I constantly gaze at it. "What do you see?" you may

wonder. I'll tell you:

perhaps it's the multi-dome brick bridge that spans

the quiet, creepy Rhine, connecting smokestack industry

with forestial fertility. Who are the go-betweens that l  i  n  g  er

on that bridge--that is the question. If just three people, then

me, you, and the specter of whichever of us gives in first. Us go-betweens,

can see/hear/feel much:

a Lutheran clergyman surreptitiously eyes a beer stand;

a dog takes a shit on the steps of an orphanage;

a man slugs his wife a good one for burning the bratwurst.

These things make me feel HUMAN, and what it is to feel

HUMAN is to have your guilt eased.

I would never shit on the steps of an orphanage or slug my wife.

But I have eyed beer stands, and I have eyed them well. HUMAN!

I am no longer dreaming of Heidelberg or Germany or castles or

blond-haired blue-eyed women or classical music because I am

too tangential. I cannot help but mourn and praise my wilting bamboo

plant: three stalks, two green, one yellow, jaundiced from weakness and

neglect. I will call the latter Abel, the first victim.

                   Abel is about to die, but certain things lift his spirits: 

         Turkish music, cool air, and mind vibes. His chloroplasts will be

            ingested by his two brothers, and they will fight greedily for them.

When we were young, manly brother, I punched you in the stomach

because I did not like the way you breathed. You shot me in the shoulder

because you did not like the way I talked. Strange now to think about it--

we laughed. we laugh.

                   There are a few alternate universes to which we should traverse,

two saints on broomsticks flying above Arkansas's humid air, past the flat

mid-west, past the interminable river, past Boston and its five thousand dialects

up, up up!

             Up, up, up!

                              UP, UP, UP!

                     

          Past Europe and Asia and heaven and past superheaven. And we'll 

dick around there for awhile, and then come back to 

                                                                                          Heidelberg.

(to be continued)