“Brighton Beach” by Michael Vizsolyi

I held up the saintly jawbone of fish

picked clean by sea-gulls,

and you imagined a fence, a garden gnome

holding a cigarette, staring past

a row of white tulips.

You mentioned Pest.

I said, look the colonnade of teeth

where we have entered,

and you made yourself

a tongue balancing between

the short wood pillars

in the stone mouth of lion

guarding a bridge to nowhere.

You said, drink brandy from a dress shoe,

take the canoe, head west:

the mayflies will fall like confetti

upon your arrival.

You imagined a bit of both

heaven and hell in the dark water,

and if you could get right down to it:

a tiny place, circled by a school of blue fish.

Two Russian men walked naked

into the freezing water. Two Russian men

walked naked out of the freezing water.

I knew the wave would reach you,

that this little Odessa would wipe

its indifferent mouth on your blue jeans.

I said we have practice with this kind of thing:

one must learn to open windows

so as not to scare the tiny bird

asleep on the ledge.