persistence of memory

Montmartre (1/4/2003)

you want to experience 
le paris romantique. 
Art de la rue 

you enter le métro at  Sèvres Babylone sardined
in the moviescene with accordion  boy 
and commuting extras            where is Amélie?

get off at Abbesses 
all arched mausoleum 
white tiles à la morgue

your francais c'est terrible 
Non. Pas anglais.
you miss la funiculaire 

climb spiral stairs up and up
(ascenseur pour l'échafaud? ) out of breath
up and up	litter supplants people 

discarded billets    a road less travelled?
suddenly irrational anxiety knifes you
eyes crave sky 	       lungs fresh air 

then you see her on grimy steps
locks curled as Michelangelo's David
asleep or 	drugged or

dead.
 
panic. don't stop. must be asleep. keep moving
you step over  and 
up
up (wrought  as iron)
up
and	out 

into the light	bienvenue 
climb la Butte	 steep cobbled streets
to Sacré-Cœur


this is better. Place du Tertre 
berets 	easels 	what you want 
to remember 

Wonderland of street artists 
Toulouse-Lautrec, Picasso  as you dreamed 
they would be 


Dali éspace exhibition 
Salvador is now an institution 
Surreal's out there	 in Paris streets.
 

But in night's middle 
you awake  yet
to horrored guilt 

see black curls 
wonder  who she was 
dare not ask 	is   she          alive 

in your mind 	forever unconscious 
      limply flowing 	down  those steps 
      like a melting Dali clock

---

(from sparrow in an airport, Friendly Street New Poets Ten, March, 2005) Originally published on The Oracular Tree ezine, May, 2004)

 

 

 

 

 

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