from Zyxt
Tra il dire e il fare
c'è di mezzo il mare
- Mario Savio
For Lyn & Leslie
I step into Pangaea, a dark little Cortland Street club down the block
from Have-a-Lick's, stepping up the small bleacher seating to the upper
rear left corner, pulling out a notebook from my black Danish book bag,
letting the competing, compelling saxophones (Ochs, Ackley, Grundfest)
lead the rhythm of the writing
Infomercials in the sky
Out-task pieces of your general outsource
We said five, it took ten
Lit by sun thru the gauze curtained window, steam curls up (coiling plume)
from my mug on the counter
Invisible just two blocks from the harbor, seagulls form a wall of white
noise
Connotations surrounding the name of Long Island followed comma
immediately by Nova Scotia
First orange streaks of day to begin my 53rd year
Sitting cross-legged atop the quilt covered bed, trying to write with this
pocket computer as you pass the open window in bra and panties
(downstairs, a whoop from the kids in the basement, lost on Lego Island)
Better to centralize captive data
The cross on that "t" looks like a nun's wimple
A pest of poetry
Next door, lone painter on a makeshift scaffold listens to up-tempo
country from boom box (further, and in opposite directions, a lawn tractor
and steady hammering) - radio hollers "Our big August meltdown, these
prices won't last"
The same last names, over and over, in the small cemetery
The giant dog quite peaceful atop the blue tarp cover load in the rear of
that pickup
First bought, best bought (liar's remorse)
All things being equal (the one condition that is never met)