Cantina Iannini - Richard Hugo

Walls were painted blue so long ago, you think
of old sky you thought lovely turned as it did,
in your lifetime, dirty. Six crude wood tables
and the pregnant cat seem permanent
on the pockmarked concrete floor. The owner
gives too much away, too much free wine
and from his eyes too much grief. His facial lines
amplify in light the too small windows
and the opaque door glass flatten out.
To enter you should be poor by consent.

You and the world that hurts you should agree
you don't deserve a penny. Nor a clear tongue
to beg sympathy from wine dark as your life
and rich as your dream you are still nothing in.
And you should agree to cross your throat
and weep when the casket passes. You should kneel
when wind crosses the olive grove in waves
of stuttering coin. At nine the light goes down.
You weave home to homes you'll never own.

Only men in broken rags come back
to drink black wine under the painting
Moonlight on Sea a drunk thought lovely—
turned as it did, in his lifetime, muddy.
You hear the wind outside turn white. Wasn't
some loud promise in another wine? Sea cliff
with a girl, her hair streamed out your lifetime
down the sky? Your wine is dead. Tomorrow
you'll return to this grim charm, not quite broken,
not quite ready to release your eyes. 



[From:
Hugo, R. (1984) Making Certain It Goes On. New York: Norton. p135 - 136]





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