Sean Cole
2 Poems
9-21-01
Postcard from Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, to David Kirschenbaum.
David,
Built a second fire, first one
stank, or at least hollowed
the shanks of 2 logs so they
sulked like valleys
cowering here, under hills
that end the monde. Am in
an inn now, but past the tree
hall, down the Cabot Trail, you enter
a National Anthem, mountains
fall to their ocean deaths. Oceans
stretch to a flat line. The smile
that hides whales hides
seals, eagles, moose, mannequins and irises.Senior.
Black birds tend to blend together, surrender
their types. One of them must
know who’s who. That crow
must know who lived and died last
year. But in blanched months, this
one say, the dirt we walk on walks.
Crow become crowd, dark
throng. March failed, was told
to taper but it hanged there
like a killed raven on a farm.
Now dead walk I’m lost who’s who.