SUBWAY SAX
He’s the sax man
of the subway,
back to the wall,
sound facing the commuters.
His eyes
are passing shadows
as his instrument
blows through
and sometimes over
the surrounding babble.
No one hears him
in the way he’d dreamed
when he was younger.
This is no concert hall,
just an underground cocoon.
The crowd is no audience.
They’re waiting for a train.
They don’t know
Sonny Stitt from Stan Getz,
Cannonball Adderley
from John Coltrane.
And, as folks occasionally
drop coins into his cup,
they’ve no idea
what it takes for
a musician like him to survive.
He plays because
there is no other way to live
They move on
figuring there has to be.
FROM THEN TILL NOW
Our first apartment was
a tiny kitchen, a cramped bathroom
and a bedroom the size of a coffin.
We ate off packing crates.
Our bed was a hand-me-down futon.
Now, we dine on shiny Formica.
We sleep on springs and linen.
She’s proud of her zip code.
I’m best friends with our mortgage.
Her dreams can take a break
now that we live some place
she’s always dreamed of.
I lie awake staring at walls, the ceiling.
I love the way they keep their distance.
NEIGHBORHOOD STROLL
garden and hedge,
orchards and fenced fields –
they are the lesser nature
for my minor Wordsworth –
strolling a path
that crosses a one-block park –
a few random oaks
fill in for forest –
a squirrel takes the time
to not be a bear
AN AMERICAN CHILDHOOD
I clearly
remember
someone telling me
though I can’t
remember who
that my childhood
had it all wrong
and that
the Indians
were the good guys
and it was
the cowboys
who were bad.
It was just
after I had
defended
an imaginary fort
against an imaginary
Apache war party.
I then
pretended to shoot
the kid
who told me this.
The press
were the enemy
even then.
YOUR FAST GUY
His glove compartment
is stuffed with speeding tickets.
He collects them like...
you bite your thought like it's a tongue,
before the word "women" slips out.
He accelerates that convertible
on a straight stretch of highway
even though you beg him to slow down.
Your feelings, his needs,
and only one steering wheel.
Will it always be like this?
A crash? A breakup?
Blood or tears –
or even both.
He's going even faster.
Your heart plays ping pong
with your throat.
You love him,
but not at this speed.
Finally, he stops,
parks by an overlook.
"Lovely," you both say,
he for the dramatic scenery,
you for the stillness.
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, Santa Fe Literary Review and Lost Pilots. Latest books: Between Two Fires, Covert and Memory Outside The Head are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in the Seventh Quarry, La Presa and California Quarterly.
%20(1).png)
