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Cliff Dwellers, oil on canvas by George Bellows (1913)
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Hot as a forge, a searing wind swivels
up Avenue A, corkscrews the laundry
dangling between windows,
swerves in and out of the slug-like traffic -
clouds thicken into
the wistful decay of Barney's Pool Room
peopled with genuine tough guys
chalking up cues, bumming smokes off
each other, feinting the usual punches
while they grit their teeth over old grudges,
rub balding skulls where hats used to sit -
East River bridges soar high and remote,
the deep tan of the surface more the style of
the homeless who gather by banks wainscoted in foam
one died in the last war and yet here he is,
another figured the big money would come
to him someday - he's still waiting -
another was married once,
is now blacklisted by his own life -
in the quiet light of a bronze moon,
they work on forgetting their names,
summer air like a steel staircase
spiraling in a neon-washed majesty
to the cheap darkness of the sky's upper floor;
coughs, health on the wane,
handsomeness and beauty
traded in for pigeon shit,
it's drinks all round at Lenny's bar
for anyone who never was.
junk oozing up from the shadows,
city takes its medicine, one arm at a time;
subway rattling underfoot,
kid bouncing a basketball on glass,
barges hauling, guys brawling,
the first drops of rain -
so glad they could make it.
*****
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in the Homestead Review, Harpur Palate and Columbia Review with work upcoming in the Roanoke Review, the Hawaii Review and North Dakota Quarterly.
