Music
by Bettina Drew

In a sweet, sweet living room,
paintings and a pine green rug,
oh books and the animals being petted,
the clairaudient foghorn saxophone
breathes out its French murder mystery sex
till the inspecteur in the derby hat,
mustached and keeping to himself,
boards the train. Oh, it's loud,
the whistle is loud and it's starting to snow,
it's Paris, you see, and the huge arcing skylights
of the Gare St. Lazare. Or Berlin, 1934,
and the widowed landlady, still in her forties,
gray hair in a bun and not bad-looking,
invites you to her wisteria wallpapered sitting room
and then gets too emotional after her schnapps.
And maybe it's New York, 1955, Frank O'Hara
leaning on the john door of the Five Spot
and Billie Holiday with a song
to make him stop breathing----.
Well, fine, but Billie and Frank are dead now,
and the first two scenes you made up from books.
Get up and turn the record over.
The shrinks'd say he was manic
that night he waltzed around the room
carried away to "On The Town"--he's
a manic-depressive, you know, and he'd been
drinking and lost his teeth.
Well, how else to live
but from one moment of ecstasy
hoping for the next, if in between
you see he's the nickel the kids put on the train rail
and then step back to watch----
It's lucky big old Brahms is your lover
these winter nights, and he sleeps on his back
as heavily as a child. In the morning he wants
coffee, and he goes out to shovel snow
wrapped up very fat in his muffler. Listen.
His arms are big to hold you. Listen.
He loves your children. Listen,
he's from here too.