You say you’ve been running around in the rain.
Me too. Even with the defense of an umbrella
It was almost too much. And then there are those
Eye bandits, like football players with a nose for the ball.
(Large men in the TV booth have been heard to speak such phrases.)
They see your hurt just when you hope they don’t.
Bus drivers are the worst. They do it to me all the time. Take my advice.
Walking is definitely your best bet. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.It’s true. I was not myself at your father’s service.
Sat there looking sort of nuts in my red polyester tie and vintage
Earth shoes—do you remember those weird things?—
Advertising my aloneness by not getting out of my chair.
You weren’t much better, dancing a jig after shouting
That your papa was done and dead. Other remarkable tributes followed.Who speaks this way except on a moment’s notice?
The same spontaneity may apply to a visit to the old cinema
On East Fifty-eighth Street. You know the one I mean, across
From the Plaza Hotel. I could use the restorative of the dark
For a while. I think I’ll go there and eat some peanuts.
Leave the shells scattered on the floor, like the monkey that I am.September 2007
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