The monkey too tired now <br />To dance <br />And feeling stupid <br />In its tiny human clothes <br />Kips on top of <br />The barrel organ <br />As if the fading day had faded <br />Back to a forgotten day <br />At the turn of the century <br /> <br />I almost expecting to see <br />Toffs in top hats & ladies in luscious dresses <br />Canes & crinolines perambulating by <br />Or to open a paper and see <br />It is 1863. <br /> <br />Time is see through now <br />And dates mean nothing. <br />Children’s voices run in & out of time <br />...trying to catch... “it! ” <br />The barrel organ man <br />looking a lot like Toulouse La Trec <br /> <br />stares out into empty space <br />not the least interested in customers <br />just doomed to turn the wheel <br />that stains the evening’s sunset <br />with everything from Abba to Verdi. <br /> <br />Poked awake <br />The monkey jumps up <br />He too doomed <br />To dance <br />his nothingness. <br />Children’s voices run off <br />into bedtimes & dreams. <br /> <br />Rotterdam is erased <br />& so am I <br />a ghost in this dusk <br />trying to read the last page of <br />Knut Hamsun’s HUNGER <br /> <br />As little lights <br />In little houses <br />Come on one after the other <br />Little patches of yellow <br />Glowing with human warmth <br /> <br />I sit among <br />The children’s swings <br />& sing <br />“Mamma Mia... <br />...here I go again! ”<br /><br />Dónall Dempsey<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/connecting-nothing-to-nothing/
