The mine shaft’s gaping mouth
yawns like the throat of an old, useless god.
Gnats hover by the scattered rocks.
This is real not a set, or a scene,
a spit of dirt shot through the sluice, all things like
a picture cut to kiss my America expectation.

In the surrounding bush, tamaracks curve towards the clouds.
The clouds where, above the furry tips of conifers, cataracts
plummet down mountainwalls, and ask:
“afraid?” And I am, I am.  I fear the sheer
slopes of tough granite slashing the giant sky
in two; the hard-edged mountain face.  The expansive air.

And this split is brooding old and unknowable
tunneling briskly into the unfamiliar, bruising
Montana a grisly purple-red
when the sun swings underground
and shades the hot **** by the mine with cool night as
behind it, the mine appears to growl.

We’ve got sweat-slicked brows, tuffs of loose, knotted hair
Our limbs dumbly droop and we stand on the roof

Of a three story flat up in Prenzlauerberg
Near five a.m. when the night’s at its end

When we shuffle our shoes and sometimes tip the *****
From the bottles that we’ve all left scattered around

Then the beer trickles down and it spreads on the ground
And turns the rooftop tar a shimmering black

I feel through my shirt the thick summer heat
The hairs on my arm, the trees in the street

Are bathing alike in a warm morning dew
And the cigarette smoke we let slip from our throats

Catches the first red rays as the sun shows its face
Through the chemical haze out in east Lichtenberg

We face the source of the light as it floods through Berlin
Not the city we know in this tangerine glow

In this rich warming shine that is washing our eyes
Black industrial pipes start to wiggle and writhe

And their steam hits the scaffolds, whose
Metal fingers grow limber as they stretch through the street

To shake the red trees from their lumbering sleep
Then the leaves that they drop start to flee and get caught

In the stares of facades in the communist bloc
With the refusal of death on their hot, heaving breath

The parks are all built out of paper and gold
With fountains that spew streams of molten stone

Our apartment stands firm in the boiling sea
Of the scars of old days which swell, throbbing like waves

It’s the city lain out, moving, alive, and just like that
A light, filmy rain sprays a sheet on the town

We try to claw it away, but the curtain stays down
Then we stir, soaked in the sun and the rain

It’s the start of the day
And we can go home to sleep and dream of sunlit Berlin

1
The blurred light of our life, a match strike, burns wild bright
friends laugh, sing, and blare swing: fast alive; rise then die
cheap bright wine, a red flying glass splash from your hand
the beat rocks the boombox; pop and lock, fitful hop
it twirls down and smacks ground to shrill sounds, red spills out
in doorframes, with cold drinks necks are craned, loudness shrinks
we peal back the silence with dance moves gone violent,
all join in and dance crazed: tables, chairs, sofas, stairs
we fling ourselves everywhere, and shout bliss and smoke air
I seize, spin you around—music rolls, celebrate.

2
In black quiet foot taps and twigs snap to this stride
and white foxes march past, watch the dance, trot on by
the still night’s our dance hall, the cracked bark its sparse wall
but sway, speckled love pair! Do the twist, jump and jive
on sharp leaves, on damp moss that’s soaked green, on mild ives
our waltz splashes stream’s glass; showers spray gleaming rain
you smile while you pluck limbs from pines’ sides to wave high
a leaf-dressed baton wand—forest song, dance along!

3
A sharp glare through broad panes; the sun’s rays hit Gate Nine
whose slant windows’ black frames light up our silhouettes
we glide boldly, steps rapping sole glee in pepped time
on lined chairs all stiff-backed; golden pairs stare perplexed
a young boy’s worn headset and pre-packaged stale bread
and smooth-gliding walkways, duty-free shopping spree
the rust-orange light scores them:  shocked faces glow, see
our haphazard mad dance past absurd potted plants
your dress flies, behind lies a dazed crowd, we glide down
the beiged boarding ramp, stamp joyous notes, thrash the floor
‘til shafts flood the torn corridor, splashing tan light
Across grey; the crowd cheers, disappears, sings our names.

4
We grasp hands and stride out towards young couples, real haut
all decked out in fine braid, a myriad masquerade
of lined pairs in tight squares and there’s music: waltz airs
which spark movement like truth bends the light, rend the night
with drum rolls and solos whose crass brass part echoes
the slow dips of grasped hips—roll and sway, pick up pace
the sweet rhythms wind lines across lines of blind hymns
champagne clatters, cries clap: shatter that! Rattatat!
I, drunk happy, toast strangers’ masked faces, change places
with laced ladies, sweep three eight-step Balboa sets
while chairs flip, the drapes rip, cymbals crash, windows smash
the dance burns the house down with loud sound, I look round
you’re not far, but right then—a sudden roar, masks, thrown, soar
above, cloud-like hang, hover—we meet and now dance
amid vivid waves of bright stares raining down, masks surround
our close dance, the mass sweeps along past the main doors
and outside, the cool rain pours in sheets, perfect sheets

And are you also frightened
Of the monsters with nighttime white faces
Of places lined ****** with traces
Of tiger-striped neighbors complacent
Are you all so frightened?

And are you also frightened
Of the German death-expert, that phantom
Of your mother turned raucously pantomime
Of a world-wide prisoners’ anthem
Are you all so frightened?

And are you also frightened
Of the nuclear holocaust schemers
Of the cannibals’ preying on dreamers
Of the new World
Are you all so frightened?

And are you also frightened
Of poetry written in free verse
Of burning alive you foolish young convert
Of the chorus of underground screams in the desert
Are you all so frightened?

Driving down the dry road to the port
Five o’clock and soon the ferry leaves
We listen to your homemade folk
Music, much too slow
Much too slow to be on time
And still, we drive lazy all the while.

Roll past mothers’ clean-cut sleeping places
Feeling ‘round for cigarettes
In your empty glove compartment
Though you no longer smoke
Shut my eyes, smoke it easy
Taking slow and separate breaths.

I am looking through my sunstained window
A place where older trees had all burnt down
Its not far to reach the docks
But I skip the soulful song
About finding love and folding boxes
Threadbare weeds and scrub have grown there now.

Pull up to the boat for my departure
Just five minutes late it starts to rain
Find my bag and coat, grasp my ticket
As the ferry throbs to life
Run to board the rusted giant
Wave to you a hard-to-see goodbye.

Look into the Innenhof
not out upon the rain-slick street
it’s easier
that way.

Decadent hail at the window
brings the history of rain
running, dripping
down your languid gaze.

Dream important things
are taking place inside the Innenhof—
while the water rises
they choke under its weight.

More water, green and choppy
the Innenhof is undone
sloshing, wet and pure, immobile—
birds are drowning.

Out of the frothy wash
your place bobs to the surface
freed of its moorings
in boring things.

You are lucky and precarious
floating on your hollow buoyancy
waiting for the rain to quit
watching the slow clouds break.

I have enjoyed a full six weeks since I last saw her, some very fine weeks.  And two days: six weeks and two days since.  I’m checking into a nice New Jersey motel.

What a fine room I’ve been given!  See the bed wrapped in sheets, sitting stately like a throne.

Shapes of flowers are scattered geometrically across the surface of the sheets, patterned to please.

After I have spent a few good minutes petting the bed and pressing the flowers, I can breathe deep, free and independent in my grand indent of a room—

The air’s a bit stale.  Ah, but there the closet in the corner, tucked so slyly into the corner, into the wall!

A perfect closet, I have to say; a clean cube with a proud hanging rack, made of imitation…is it oak? (the plastic much more stable than wood, of course)

It’s a fine time to get settled, so I’ll arrange my closet-things: the jacket and pants on the left, a shirt and jeans on the right.

The shirt has a pale stain at the bottom, the stain must be wine, the stain must be from some dinner we… I really don’t know how to remember I don’t know it’s just another stain.

That stain is red, like lipstick.

Well!  The windows are nice and what curtains!  Tall, beige and dotted with beach scenes—very picturesque.  There, right there in front of me, on the curtain, sweet babes build a sandcastle, and build it so well!

Past the babes and through the window I see the parking lot—better not look there…it’s got scraggly weeds yawning through the pavement, and the road beyond leads to the city, like all roads.

What else there must be something else—there, the standing lamp in the corner.  I’ll turn it on now, as its getting dark.

I need help describing it, the lamp.  Only the words ‘straight,’ ‘thin,’ and ‘lost’ come to mind.  In my travel thesaurus I find:

‘Spindly,’ and

‘wistful,’ ‘withdrawn.’ It is, I guess, observant and alone, that should do for now.

Here I am, laying in bed, reaching to turn down the lamp, and I realize with admiration

How wonderfully exact a copy the room’s second bed is of my own bed—starched stiff and neatly tucked at the corners, this one with a pattern of swans swimming laid across its sheets.