"This melancholy London - I sometimes imagine that the souls of the lost are compelled to walk through its streets perpetually. One feels them passing like a whiff of air. - W. B. Yeats

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Thanksgiving

High and playing off a plastic keyboard piano

London, England-fingers flying,

I am living vicariously off of

This delicate, strong blond performer.

My own fingers are perpetually cold here.

Chords are dancing by like horses

Pulling a carriage

19th century style

Trotting along, carrying the post.

The sun sets early

On the British empire

The car headlights speed by

Sixteen’o’clock,

Dragging by the last smells of summer,

Lying damp and tired

In the piles of leaves on every corner.

The swampish smell of indoors

A muddy sauna

Evaporates in the air.

I could go for a plate of something.

Maybe a hot glass of something or other.

My cheeks feel red and smooth with cold.

It won’t be Christmas for-

It’s thanksgiving-

And won’t be Christmas for weeks.

And yet I feel like

At any moment

I could be curled up back to a warm fire.

This piano sounds

Like electronic heaven.

My heels are warm beneath my legs.

I might be feeling something

For the first time in weeks.

With no dinner, and no drink, and no

Laying-of-the head down.

And I feel like I should preserve the time.

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