Enjoyed the journey, Max. But don't get itchy feet!
Andrew
On 22 October 2015 at 03:39, Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Quite the tale(s) there, Max. And it does move through them.
>
> I almost wish you’d named some of the ‘callers’ in 2…
>
> Poem as travelogue…
>
> Doug
> > On Oct 21, 2015, at 9:40 AM, Max Richards <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> > My Trip East
> >
> > began badly, ended better.
> > Leaving Seattle -
> > painfully early start,
> > palpitating heart,
> > late, not quite too late.
> >
> > Ouf! settling in our seats,
> > she of course by the window,
> > I with, at my elbow,
> > shoulder, thigh and calf,
> > a big man pressing flesh
> >
> > flat five long hours...
> > Here’s Boston and relief;
> > to genteel Cambridge,
> > our high hotel room.
> > Walking out round
> >
> > Harvard Square, here’s
> > the Coop Bookshop,
> > still sublime. Fancy,
> > on one’s doorstep!
> > If only books weighed less -
> >
> > note their names for later on.
> > Sleep now and sleep in:
> > Friday she can drowse,
> > I tour bookshops and browse.
> > Groliers - still all poetry!
> >
> > quiet, faithful, orderly -
> > I could spend a fortune
> > here; chatting quietly,
> > the assistant so informed
> > (elderly, naturally).
> >
> > I tell her: in another age
> > in the other Cambridge,
> > John Ashbery read at King’s,
> > supported by Bill Manhire,
> > who outshone him.
> >
> > This I'd seen and heard -
> > oh both good, the Kiwi
> > merely better-tuned.
> > Fame is Manhattan, maybe.
> > Manhire is Wellingtoned.
> >
> > I exit empty-handed,
> > even deferring buying
> > Kiwis - much-travelling,
> > some read, mostly unread,
> > down under and unheard.
> >
> > 2
> > While the wife earnestly
> > conference-goes at Lesley,
> > I’m free to meet my friend
> > the professor. In Divinity’s
> > old building, see,
> >
> > this lecture room so tiny,
> > where Emerson told
> > young America to be
> > American. Michael and I
> > transfer it to our Auckland
> >
> > fifty years back when
> > such calls, needed and heeded,
> > woke us to the local, then
> > the regional, the native,
> > the new place so ‘other’
> >
> > than the Old Country
> > (which we hadn’t seen);
> > the need for roots,
> > new shoots, for fruits
> > distinctive. Well, has it
> >
> > happened? or are we
> > still near the British coast?
> > like Shetland, with more sheep?
> > or rocky Cornwall at most?
> > Underpopulated,
> >
> > tethered, provincial?
> > From our old shared homeland
> > he shows me new books.
> > When I read them, they’ll
> > settle some doubts.
> >
> > 3
> > I have a deferred date
> > in Quincy Street:
> > three museums of art
> > in one, made greater
> > by new architecture.
> >
> > Artworks from all times
> > and places seem at home.
> > Expatriation, yes,
> > but caring curators bless
> > the works for our caress.
> >
> > 4
> > Her weekend conference done,
> > it’s time to fly to Brooklyn,
> > to see if here’s the place she needs.
> > If all your life you’ve never felt
> > your home was home,
> >
> > dreams draw you on.
> > Next day in our rented room
> > she sleeps; I walk Park Slope
> > up gentrifying avenues
> > to Prospect Park, her hope
> >
> > in my pocket. Yes, she might
> > try life here and feel it’s right.
> > Here’s where we’d shop,
> > walk the dogs, go to plays,
> > slip to Manhattan by subway.
> >
> > Next day she says we’ve seats
> > for a great new show on Broadway.
> > Let’s go in time to walk
> > Manhattan’s High Line Park!
> > We do, and here she spies
> >
> > on either side, as we stroll
> > with all the rapt strollers
> > through gardens of delight,
> > apartments for lease - each right
> > for making her home,
> >
> > her first true home. Chelsea?
> > yes, please, the thrills of Town,
> > the quiet of the High Line,
> > prospects of the Hudson,
> > walking dogs easily.
> >
> > 5
> > We fly out towards Seattle
> > next night, while Jet Blue’s fly-hi
> > brings her laptop the best
> > properties for lease in Chelsea.
> > She’s singing to herself
> >
> > some song by Joni Mitchell
> > she always knew carried
> > for her some promise of home.
> > Myself, I carry in my satchel
> > the poet* saying ‘no home like place.’
> >
> > The home he left when I did,
> > shares our hearts with some
> > very ‘other’ places, good for a time.
> > East West - home’s best?
> > North South - anywhere there’s rest.
> >
> > [for my wife Marilyn Black
> > and my old friend *Michael D Jackson]
>
> Douglas Barbour
> [log in to unmask]
>
> Recent publications: (With Sheila E Murphy) Continuations & Continuation 2
> (UofAPress).
> Recording Dates (Rubicon Press).
>
> Done in by creation itself.
>
> I mean the gods. Not us. Well us too.
> The gods moved into books. Who wrote the books?
> We wrote the books. In whose dream, then are we dreaming?
>
> Robert Kroetsch.
>
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