(Maybe if these poems included the name of the bar they could be part of the Don’t Miss This New York Guidebook, in verse)
The Hamilton 998 Amsterdam Avenue New York
(overheard)
I have a son. It was the 60’s.
We were hippies and we wanted
him to be a king. So we named him
Raja. Not Dweezel or Moon Unit.
Just Raja. He hated his name
so when he could he became Ronald.
A couple on the seats near me (across the aisle)
don’t get along although they look alike (my friend
Gail said years ago I don’t write conflict). Both
middle aged maybe 50 good looking similar
expensive sneakers. Black. Fit might be their word.
They’re both Fit. He has a subtle Rolex hers a subtle Cartier
she’s wearing Prada jeans. They both appear
to have no discernible fat. Before the plane takes off
he says I left my Wall Street Journal (sic)
in the overhead rack in the carryon in Row 27 implying
that she should go get it and she who is on the aisle
says I’ll stand up. You go. And he, not happy with her
answer replies, annoyed: Don’t Bother.
I Won’t she says.
This is a Preface, not a poem:
a few people who have been reading these for a while know I’ve had Many Ideas
for ongoing series such as Don’t Miss This: A Guidebook in Verse. I Love Love Love
New York even now and have long thought a verse guidebook maybe even
with the amazing pictures of Matthew Septimus. Here’s one Very Small Example:
(Here’s the poem)
Chesray among
a thousand things daughter in law
mother of Ahava etcetc she’s directed
Fabulation by Lynn Nottage
a very good play not the usual
You Can Guess What Happens
Even if Its a Big Metaphor story
young black and brown performers
Harlem School of the Arts
Feb 28, 29, March 1
we who live in New York often haven’t been
so many places and if I were to write
An Ongoing Series (maybe I will
and maybe I won’t) Fabulation
directed by Chesray Dolpha would
be right there on the list.
Mark took us to an Italian place
one of those restaurants that uses
Fine Dining on their website I have avoided
Fine Dining advertisers on principle can’t
they think of something a little more
evocative a little more humble, You
Might Like This Meal for instance
I had spaghetti and clam
sauce a very good rum cake and if
I were forced to summarize this particular restaurant
maybe even write a meal summary in verse do
restaurant critics write in verse probably not
I’d title the review Good Enough.
Never do I write
a poem on Sunday morning
even though I could
Unscheduled days
absolutely no subliminal message no need
for urgent descriptions of people or politics
(although a woman yesterday, Pnina, kibbutznik
who moved, 50 years ago, to Athens, Ohio
to start a kibbutz and she did and they’re all still there
she could be a poem.
Nevada caucuses could be a poem too but
not this one. This poem is about Saturdays and how
for those of us who don’t have to work on Saturdays
we listen to Glenn Gould’s Goldberg Variations
celebrate Nina Simone’s birthday by hearing
as much as we want of Nina Simone
walk to the store and buy raw cashews and shredded coconuts and curry powder
roast them together finish reading Girl Woman, Other
consider the difference between admiration and love.