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Board Administrator Username: mjm Post Number: 3312 Registered: 11-1998 |
I. A Wee Cloud As I squat on the john, I see through the bathroom window in blue sky, a wee cloud, evolving white. I'm Robert George Burns, smoking a stogie, and it's the face of a white-bearded man composed of smoke rings. He winks at me, old lecher. Now a hand, the fist unfolding, fingers flicking out. Now an archipelago of islands, drifting apart, dissipating, leaving nothing, only blue sky. II. Ditton Junction A place to pass through when motoring east to Widnes or Manchester, or hurtling from Euston to Lime Street, a sad station platform with the maroon BritRail sign, I gaze out of the flyspecked window at a grassy moat, railway sidings, chemical dumps, curve of the Mersey in the distance, the Childe of Hale's church tower: John Middleton, 9 ft 3 wrestler at the court of James the drooling Scot, dumper on tobacco, all very PC, long before PC. Oh, but I was talking about Ditton. III. Caveseeking Like a cat, I craved shelter, a womb, I arranged dad's deckchairs into a bedouin tent. In the tall grass behind the church, I made a hide along with my cousins Robin and Julie, a lair from which we'd spy on Mrs Murgatroyd's excursion to Barleycorn, the greengrocer, Petrie, the butcher, for a leg of lamb, 5 pounds of spuds for Sunday. At night, I dived under the blankets, spelunked deep, to crawl toward a lost world, the door to tomorrow. IV. A Backward Glance I'm driving up Charles Street, in my rearview, Baltimore at night, Robert Mills' classical column to the first President rises ghost white far behind me and landmarks of my past sweep past me as I drive; my first slushy kiss with Andrea, beeches on the Hopkins campus scarred with our initials; First English Lutheran where Susan and I married, for the second time, then mmmm, divorced again-- Were we nuts or what? Yes, I found trouble like glue- traps. Michael Franks sings, "On our own, we have grown, but freedom means that you're all alone--" V. My Epitaph O dauntless bard splendid in success constant in defeat dashing worker of words enquiring mind recording all he saw life's battle ended he sleeps well beside his muse, in heaven as on earth a helpmate worthy of a hero |
