John Ashbery: “The Skaters”

-23-

	The train is still sitting in the station.
	You only dreamed it was in motion.

	There are only a few travelers on Z high road.
	Behind a shutter, two black eyes are watching them.
	They belong to the wife of P, the high-school principal.

	It was forty-odd years ago I first saw you
	Coming over the self-same track.

	And I still walk out to meet you.
	The screen door bangs in the wind, one of the hinges is loose.
	And together we look back at the house.
	It could use a coat of paint
	Except that I am too poor to hire a workman.
	I have all I can do to keep body and soul together
	And soon, even that relatively simple task may prove to be beyond my powers.

	That was a good joke you played on the other guests.
	A joke of silence.

	One seizes these moments as they come along, afraid
	To believe too much in the happiness that might result
	Or confide too much of one's love and fear, even in
	Oneself.

	The spring, though mild, is incredibly wet.
	I have spent the afternoon blowing soap-bubbles
	And am unfit for the company of my fellow humans.

	And it is with a feeling of delight I realize I am
	All alone in the skittish darkness.
	The birch-pods come clattering down on the weed-grown marble pavement.
	And a curl of smoke stands above the triangular wooden roof.

	Seventeen years in the capital of Foo-Yung province!
	Surely woman was born for something
	Besides continual fornication, retarded only by menstrual cramps.

	I had thought of announcing my engagement to you
	On the day of the first full moon of X month.