Visiting Poet 

                   With a silent movie's flicker on an aster sky, 
                   the starlings wheel St. Mary's spire, tilt,
                   so that, like Venetian blinds, you see less
                   of them. Later (after espresso at 

                   The Rubáiyát), the ivy walls screechscreech
                   screechscreech like rusty cot springs. Can you see
                   even one among the leaves? And in
                   an alleyway of old brick walls, zapped

                   by lightning fire escapes, against a gust
                   of burger-scent and grime, I make a lantern
                   of my fist. Get grit in eye. Cigarette lit.
                   And see behind a dingy windowpane

                   one red geranium. And later still,
                   the clean-edged roofs against an orchid sky.

 

 

Copyright © 2005 by Larry Kimmel