Raymond Farr


NY Had Snuffed Bar Fly Written All Over It
1.
The glare of
A quiet street

Without any faces
& winter leaves us

Staring at the joke
Of a leafless tree

Country Joe
& the Fish

Having played
In someone’s

Apartment all night
& the apartment

Empty & quiet
By daybreak

& so we try & make
Ourselves invisible to

Winter, I guess,
But we only make

Ourselves invisible
To each other—

The bus broken
Down on icy

Hemphill Street
       & even if

We stand here
Staring at the joke

Of a leafless tree
Life is the same

If we stare or not
Life is the same

2.
It is a Tuesday
There are 10

Trillion things
We know with

Absolute certainty
That we should

Not know with
Any absolute

Certainty—
The window

Is the window
For instance

In the same way
That the anonymous

Girl in the video
Is just the

Anonymous girl
In the video

           She stands
Naked, but for two

White garters,
Her face at a window

Overlooking…what?
The Big Apple?

The Unreal City?
                It’s not

So much that
She’s altogether

Unaware of the
Trick the next

The next few
Minutes will play

On her
           Or the wan

Halo of glare that
Surrounds her head

                It’s more
The way the clock

Is anything but a
Relentless lover

How it’s 11:56 EST
& the killer walks in—

A relaxed person,
Young, nothing

Of the monster—
& shuts the door

Softly behind him
                It’s how

We feel this ellipsis
This pause—

3.

It had been raining but
It had not been raining
—John Ashbery

You were
The girl,

I said,
Reading

Necromance
On the F train

That night
She said,

I was
The girl

That night
Reading

The Tennis
Court Oath

She stared
Intensely

At the strange
Weave of

The lines
In my

Palm
This one’s

Adventure,
She said—

I see the
Inevitable

Long
Downward

Spiral of
The rain

Another
Leads

To an
Over-

Whelming
Question

She told me,
Beware

The banks
Of a black

River!
It’s

Where
You

Perish,
She said,

Riding
Love’s

Blue
Bicycle

Four More Poems by Raymond Farr

 
 
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