Inverted white air white-blue snow con-
gealed on concrete the sense of swimming under
an ice sheet at 6,000 feet
& where have those distinct moments
gone to in space &
frozen fog & frozen wrought iron
gestures
& black & white freight trains
on the plaza’s historical markers
those distinct snowdome moments
a store window window-shopping
a scarlet cowboy shirt a wooden cross
pinned with a tin star en-
circled with rusted barbed wire
this is what I wanted to say when the sun came up
once upon a time when time was liquid &
chromatic in
every direction
the canteloupe glow over I-79 in a June driving
east by northeast but it’s this
March in Cheyenne in gray-white air
a row of skateboards & a Dark Side of the Moon
t shirt & my reflection
in plate glass framed by bricks in-
verted white air white-blue snow con-
gealed on concrete
have I gone into time in a paradox a
wooden cross pinned with a tin star
the Union Pacific depot
graystone in frozen fog a galloping
horse statue hulking oxidized geometric
& no yellow freight trains in sight
Jack Hayes
© 2010
[To see other poems in this sequence, please click on the "UP Poems" label]
Raw, cold, metallic...and gorgeous.
ReplyDeleteLike a fruit tree burdened with too much fruit, it hid behind a glut of wonderful lines and phrases, but on a second reading opened up and was just wonderful.
ReplyDeletea scarlet cowboy shirt a wooden cross..........
ReplyDeleteAnother Bravo!
Hi Willow, Dave & Tony
ReplyDeleteWillow: Thanks!
Dave: Glad it came together for you! Thanks for stopping by.
Tony: Thanks! They were actually in a shop window.
he canteloupe glow over I-79
ReplyDeleteLove this description, and I can see it so clearly.
I like how things go from frozen, to a kind of soft liquid movement, to frozen again. A rusty metallic frozenness, something that's permanently chilly. Great choice of language throughout.
Hi HKatz: Thanks a lot--I do very much appreciate the things that you "get" in my poems. Yes, that was just about how the sun looked one morning a long time ago above Lake Erie.
ReplyDeleteI love the sense of movement in this. Great structure! I can't remember what you called this style. (?)
ReplyDeleteHi Karen: Thanks! So glad you like it. I don't have a name for it--it's just something that's developing as I work on these poems (or poem).
ReplyDelete