Celeste, the film on TV was called
Don’t Look Back, from which you were
Spared by your classical training.
Even this morning I bear the pain of it,
Dylan’s angel beauty burnished,
Not consumed, by his words of fire.A theater down the block was where
I saw it first with my girlfriend Sarah.
A Food Emporium stands there now
(waxed apples and taste-free tomatoes
And meats that are not for me).
“He’s a genius and you’ll never be
A genius. You’re not even smart,”
She said to me that crisp fall night back then.
Her family had a four-bedroom apartment
And a country place and Harvard
And Radcliffe as elements of their pedigree.Her parents are gone and the property too
But I received a card from Sarah
Over Christmas in block letters,
Her children’s hand informing me
She wears tissues in her ears and carries
A blade to slash the viperous tongues
That would torment her days.Oh Celeste, the phone rang late
On this night that the moon had spurned
And I was there to answer a man child
All alone who wanted
To drink himself into eternity
And make it glow so he could be
The brightest star in the firmament.
And so I encouraged him to pray for half
The time we had been speaking
And align himself with the greater good
The universe is calling us to.Celeste, let this be a record of where things stand
Before they shift again so you won’t ever
Lose sight of me in the space you said I could have.January 2004