09-27-2016, 05:57 PM
Where I make a mistake, get lost and take the wrong path, take drugs, travel, and talk with a stranger, without ever trying to write a villanelle about haggis.
Where are you going? a photographer wants
to know. I’m lost on the ship’s vast stairway,
people dressed for a party milling around me.
I ask where I can disembark and he laughs
Do you even know where you are? He opens
a map made of tiles, points out a tiny island
near the Pole. Confused I shake my head but
his feral assistant insists it’s true.
10 o’clock, a mechanical voice announces,
the bar is now open. I follow the crowd but
they go to the Post Office’s waterproof door
and wait near a brass band tuning up.
I ask a uniformed guide Where is the bar? He
finds it marked on his map, leaves without me.
I follow a coloured line to where tiny gay waiters
walk like Qantas stewards carrying trays, jugs
of liquid and white glasses, down the sloping
deck. I’m still wondering about photographers
and who is that woman dressed all in in red,
watching - is she following me, and why?
I stop a waiter and order a Scotch and ice, drop
coins, passport, tickets, while trying to find my card,
ask him to repeat the price. I still can’t hear clearly.
Each time he answers it increases until I don’t
have enough money. He serves others whose drinks
all cost a dollar. Something is very wrong. Outside
they’re letting lifeboats down. An iceberg looms.
We lurch.
Where are you going? a photographer wants
to know. I’m lost on the ship’s vast stairway,
people dressed for a party milling around me.
I ask where I can disembark and he laughs
Do you even know where you are? He opens
a map made of tiles, points out a tiny island
near the Pole. Confused I shake my head but
his feral assistant insists it’s true.
10 o’clock, a mechanical voice announces,
the bar is now open. I follow the crowd but
they go to the Post Office’s waterproof door
and wait near a brass band tuning up.
I ask a uniformed guide Where is the bar? He
finds it marked on his map, leaves without me.
I follow a coloured line to where tiny gay waiters
walk like Qantas stewards carrying trays, jugs
of liquid and white glasses, down the sloping
deck. I’m still wondering about photographers
and who is that woman dressed all in in red,
watching - is she following me, and why?
I stop a waiter and order a Scotch and ice, drop
coins, passport, tickets, while trying to find my card,
ask him to repeat the price. I still can’t hear clearly.
Each time he answers it increases until I don’t
have enough money. He serves others whose drinks
all cost a dollar. Something is very wrong. Outside
they’re letting lifeboats down. An iceberg looms.
We lurch.