With Spring Arrives Blossoms, Bridges, And Old Kobayashi* (W/ Nods Toward Hart Crane**, His Eros)- A Love Story Poem by Warren Falcon

What a strange thing!
to be alive
beneath cherry blossoms. - Kobayashi Issa



1
From the roof tonight
Brooklyn Bridge and
and that Other*** so
close beside

blue curves shape
city-glow orange into pink into
rose

letting their girders
down they follow to my little
room at last

the bare bulb astonished

after all the years they have
winked tenement distances
over tar over stoops disturbing
only the prudish pigeons


through my open window
with their faithful light
they finally arrive

this night of wavering curtains


2

I recline then

on the sag sofa

beside the black mirror


evening air heavy


from certain blossoms

a pungent semen smell



Kobayashi, can 'stain' rhyme with 'Spring'?

Will 'Spring' ever rhyme again with 'screen' or 'crane'?


3
One touches the other which touches me

I am become a massive bird
bent backwards

a wobbling kite of tallow and tin
a bruised three-blade fan

petroleum kisses over
massive cables between coiled

legs those others of mortar
of hot metal glow

the handsome welder masked sings
into the retina of his dark glass

of a strange
thing breached

entwined with bridges
a bloated form of
tangled arcs/angles

how lips chafe
gently the many
necks curved
of alloy
million-groined


4
A Balthus mirror

breaks

drunk on blossoms


sways

easily seduced

by bridges

*

now nothing's

changed that

can surprise

discreet

ginkgoes


it is spring

after all

*

nothing to do Mr. Kobayashi

but to open the worn book with

your name upon it and try again

page by yellow page

like you to be a mensch *****


>>><<<

*Kobayashi Issawas a Japanese poet and lay Buddhist priest of the Jōdo Shinshū sect known for his haiku poems and journals. He is better known as simply Issa (一茶) , a pen name meaning Cup-of-tea (lit. 'one [cup of] tea') . He is regarded as one of the four haiku masters in Japan, along with Bashō, Buson and Shiki — 'the Great Four.' - edited from wikipedia on Kobayashi

**Hart Crane (July 21,1899 - April 27,1932)was an American poet who wrote modernist poetry that was difficult, highly stylized, and ambitious in its scope. In his most ambitious work, The Bridge, Crane sought to write an epic poem...that expressed a more optimistic view of modern, urban culture. In the years following his suicide at the age of 32, Crane has been hailed by playwrights, poets, and literary critics alike, as being one of the most influential poets of his generation. - edited from wikipedia entry on Crane

***Manhattan Bridge, its girders painting sky blue, is just north of Brooklyn Bridge, both bridges join Manhattan and Brooklyn on the east side of the East River.

****Balthus - Balthasar Klossowski de Rola, best known as Balthus, was a Polish-French modern artist. Throughout his career, Balthus rejected the usual conventions of the art world. Some of his most well known paintings are of swooning young girls or women gazing into handheld mirrors in lonely, well-appointed interiors. - edited from wikipedia entry on Balthus

*****mensch - a Yiddish word for a person of integrity and honor.