and then he was dead

     by Bruce Weber

yeah then he was gone. nobody missed him. except of course for the poets. but the poets miss everything. poets carry around the dead like necklaces or bracelets or talismans. fold the dead neatly into poems beside the few measly dollars in their wallet. and write odes or epitaphs or sweet little quatrains to how much a part of the world he was. because poets are you know. part of everything. cosmic creatures of a most peculiar sort. humming schubert while rhyming impossible words together. but then of course he was dead. there was no denying the heart attack in new york’s most beloved bookstore on a frigid day in winter. he had probably just bought the newest translation of rimbaud and was going to have a café au lait at the corner before awaiting the next reading at the tavern off 14th street. first he’d stumble confusing his feet with the barricades of the french revolution and find a place looking out on the cavalcade heading down broadway like the world was on a conveyor belt on fast forward. he’d pull out his pen and write a poem and dunk a donut or two smiling in amusement at the world passing by his jaundiced eye in love with every crack in its armor every phosphorescent twinkle every bite into the eve’s apple every delicious word just sitting on his tongue like a new year’s streamer awaiting a breath of cool air to jettison up his imagination to the moon and stars