Poems 1971-2019

Ici. La.

We are here in France. Montpellier. Ici.
The Café des Trois Graces is over there. La.
The Cafe d’Or there, the Rive Gauche over there.
Trois Graces is anarchiste, d’Or conservatif,
the last, communiste.
Customers never lose their appetite for politics
or for daydreams with women passing by
on their way to work.
Sete, probably ten minutes away. The check lashes out. La!

Ici. La. Keep an eye on the bricks just there,
especially the ones that move.
To the left is one of Braque’s pitchers,
to the right, a hallway in mid-afternoon, say 3:00,
In the middle, a recollection,
Cézanne brings the colors to the surface. Ici.
Ruisdael, whose fireplace goes back and back. La

The Foundation Will Disperse Its Leaves

So the bushes get leafy in May, or should they not
survive the winter, not, but in any case, the number of
leaves, added or subtracted to the weather, determine
the quantity of kindness available. This makes our
bookkeeping easy.
It means for the customer, if there is a late frost,
she’ll have glowing skin but petting dogs will be more
dangerous. And moving refrigerators downstairs?
Fierce. Fierce. The cost of living will soar. And the
women you were anxious to see will hardly suspect
your presence in the room.
And if the weather holds? There’ll be clickety
heels. On the park statues, smooth inner thighs. In the
knotty muscles of pine, a loosening. On the long face of
winter? Smiles, like dividends.
Whatever happens, when our operation closes
in October, we will distribute the remainder to the
infirm that they can pull through the cold months. This
method is company policy and came from the Founder,
not on tablets, but in a loose-leaf notebook gilded with frost.