Sleeping on a Roof
Posted: 24 Jan 2020, 22:11
Sleeping on a Roof
She brought me home from a reading,
saying no poet should sleep so rough--
then trimmed my long hair,
scissors striding expertly.
She waitressed during the day.
I wandered the streets
admiring the dark barges of rain clouds,
the Chinatown bins
of ice and fish, the bay’s white skirts....
Increasingly she scolded:
"Get a job...
Why shouldn't poets work?
Are they any better
than short order cooks,
doctors, janitors?"
I tried to accept the idea.
After all, maybe Homer, too,
bending to his wife's will,
wrote poetry on the side.
I think of him
repairing sandals as his trade.
Was it while working that he first thought
of the Achilles heel?
I could see my future:
employed, I would be released
like an osprey
whose torn wing has mended.
I moved back to my old address,
3 stories above the pavement.
Look, even the stars
have welcomed me back,
lighting their penny candles
so I will never again lose
my way home.
She brought me home from a reading,
saying no poet should sleep so rough--
then trimmed my long hair,
scissors striding expertly.
She waitressed during the day.
I wandered the streets
admiring the dark barges of rain clouds,
the Chinatown bins
of ice and fish, the bay’s white skirts....
Increasingly she scolded:
"Get a job...
Why shouldn't poets work?
Are they any better
than short order cooks,
doctors, janitors?"
I tried to accept the idea.
After all, maybe Homer, too,
bending to his wife's will,
wrote poetry on the side.
I think of him
repairing sandals as his trade.
Was it while working that he first thought
of the Achilles heel?
I could see my future:
employed, I would be released
like an osprey
whose torn wing has mended.
I moved back to my old address,
3 stories above the pavement.
Look, even the stars
have welcomed me back,
lighting their penny candles
so I will never again lose
my way home.