Hydra Waterfront |
by Neeli Cherkovski |
|
HYDRA WATERFRONT For Harold Norse Neeli Cherkovski yes the water is perfect and still, the Flying Dolphin skids on the Gulf and slow only moments before enterin the harbor and gliding to the waterfront, it’s a rugged land of rocks and whitewashed facades on Hydras the Venetian palaces give supplication to Helios, Jackie O visited while I was there, and your pal Leonard Cohen saw “a bird on a wire” which landed in a song, there was the British expatriate who painted his way into an alcoholic dream. . . no, I haven't been there for seven years, and you were put into a home in Hayes Valley, assigned to a room that looks out on a tree and you loved to wander, the attendants took care to meet your needs I'd come to see you in advanced age, eyes shining and poems burning up in a drawer, we had to walk the waterfront and feel the breeze on Hydra once I made love to a young man from Salonika, (Hal, he had dark, hairy legs). we spent five days in a room by the port, the chubby matron who brought us food would giggle, knowing. . . I loved your poems about every Hydra sprinkled over many lands, your shades of sensibility flowing on the wharf, awake like a seabird cawing at the action on the waterfront you told me about the donkey boy who was hung like a horse, was he the wizened old man I saw gathering memories on the stone pier jutting into the harbor? I miss you more than I miss you, I guess it is a love without measure, you were the man who showed me at least one way out of solitude and back to the self I picture you on Hydra in the 50s, sitting poised to write of the people below your window, the donkeys braying, crowds milling across the water in the harbor over time down to those catacombs below the poem |
< Prev | Next > |
---|
Featured Art: |
---|