Copenhagen, 1995
As adversaries we made good
lovers, made heat where there was little else
to hold in common but youth and wanderlust
until I found her with a former valentine reclining
under skyrockets of wilted mistletoe,
where the yuletide ebbed and “Auld Lang Syne”
wheezed away on chariots of snow.
My buckling knees upturned a crate of Clementines
which drummed a stumblehearted rhythm
across the snowcrust at her feet.
Yellow gloves to my elbows in the suds late
closing at Spiseloppen, an eatery for hippies
and bikers from Pusher Street who tipped me
with blocks of hash. The waitress first palmed
bits of sintered brick like deposit slips
at the window where I had cried
Klare! then shuffled trays of pint glasses
and flatware in water blued by sanitizing tablets,
and I waved a latex thanks to the flame-haired socialists
who toasted me as they toasted the chefs as well.
Like a cat on pine
needles, I danced the waitress out to smoke
a chillum with the piano man. Much of an hour.
Who could interrupt her stunning
a parked window with her pout, soothing wrinkles
from her apron? Damp flame with a burnt Prince
Light behind my ear, I began to mimic liquid
and the moment’s departure like crowds ungathering,
the waitress leading me kittenish and heart-
starved across cold cobble in the rawboned motif
of a morning. I was the only chirping, songlets
and the eking moon, throat bells keening, I moved
my mind toward her mouth. Stuffed tiger, she said,
I will carry you home in my teeth.
--GREGORY PARDLO
lovers, made heat where there was little else
to hold in common but youth and wanderlust
until I found her with a former valentine reclining
under skyrockets of wilted mistletoe,
where the yuletide ebbed and “Auld Lang Syne”
wheezed away on chariots of snow.
My buckling knees upturned a crate of Clementines
which drummed a stumblehearted rhythm
across the snowcrust at her feet.
Yellow gloves to my elbows in the suds late
closing at Spiseloppen, an eatery for hippies
and bikers from Pusher Street who tipped me
with blocks of hash. The waitress first palmed
bits of sintered brick like deposit slips
at the window where I had cried
Klare! then shuffled trays of pint glasses
and flatware in water blued by sanitizing tablets,
and I waved a latex thanks to the flame-haired socialists
who toasted me as they toasted the chefs as well.
Like a cat on pine
needles, I danced the waitress out to smoke
a chillum with the piano man. Much of an hour.
Who could interrupt her stunning
a parked window with her pout, soothing wrinkles
from her apron? Damp flame with a burnt Prince
Light behind my ear, I began to mimic liquid
and the moment’s departure like crowds ungathering,
the waitress leading me kittenish and heart-
starved across cold cobble in the rawboned motif
of a morning. I was the only chirping, songlets
and the eking moon, throat bells keening, I moved
my mind toward her mouth. Stuffed tiger, she said,
I will carry you home in my teeth.
--GREGORY PARDLO