errol miller
A WORLD AWAY FROM UPPER MANHATTAN
Last night the moon fell
and I couldn't find it, I dreamed
heaven was all around the mill, Urbana burned
and Tara rose again, an American river of blue
ran down to seashore and the history of Russia
was rewritten to include peace in our time
along the East River terra-cotta tenants
flanked the Opera House, begging for music
and death was on a Neoclassical holiday
so powerful these allied images, God is re-examining
the fire at Coconut Grove, God is re-thinking
Vietnam and the till of civil wars
white-oaks, they grieve and pout and carry on
all the comings, all the goings, downtown
in the Village, the yellow newsprint of morning
is served with chicory coffee, eyes sparkle
in Georgian splendor, and professional people
say grace before every meal, gown children
write home again and Asheville is designated
Dixie's official homeplace, all these
stucco things could be, if only and that Jazz
does Scott Fitzgerald and Garbo live
what about the promise of the promise form good books
in the beginning and afterwards, along Highway 80
and in vintage New Orleans, there is a ribbon
of lifestyle silk binding us as one
that grand design, even at Wilmington
the canal hugs the land side
and Confederate and Union dead share
the anteroom of death, alluvial darkness
seeps form the Mississippi at Natchez
water has been drawn in cool buckets
and Papa is dead: Mama, do you miss him
this pastel surrogate life we live
handed down from birth-slap, typically
hidden from view the unseen world flutters
as it is and could be in Massachusetts
in the outback of Cape Fear and in the songs
of the choir at New Light Baptist Church.
