Two-Story Livingroom
is eight steps down from rest of
apartment. You pause at top chin
up back straight staring hard into
middle distance: deliver fallen
consort's funeral oration to sobbing
thousands at Roman Forum even the
bird-hawkers quiet for once or
swoop down fast on tiptoe hoops a-
swing like a fire bell Scarlet O'Hara
escaping naptime at the barbecue
to rendezvous with Ashley in the
library or you imagine last noisy
carom down the stairs you hard-
aging Hollywood star of the 1920's
you can't even pay those young men
any more that last quart of booze
did you in. About that middle
distance: how you love to tease
sweet hoaxable real-life spouse -
today the workers are coming to
put a giant platform in the middle
of the room; sorry if it interferes
with twelve-foot-high bookcases for
Dear's antique medical books ... you'll
have that room for your own even if
it's got to be a box in the air.
Mary Winters
