Telephone Booth,1975 Poem by Bernard Henrie

Summer turned us copper
like Indian sepoys.

Steam trains running through rickety
almond groves, overcrowded
in those years and suffering air attacks.

I walked the little town, too hung-over
to remember the rhyme-scheme
of a villanelle.

Now I swim alone in baggy trunks
at the 42nd Street Y.

At my hotel, I sit opposite a telephone
booth; a dome light turns on
when the doors close.

The white dusk shoots in.