Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE PARTY TURNS FIFTY, by TONY TRIGILIO


Poetry Explorer

Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE PARTY TURNS FIFTY, by                    
First Line: One room
Subject(s): Television; Tv


Television is about people sitting in their living room looking at their
things.
-- Allen Ginsberg

One room
across the river
from Boston -- a man, woman, their TV.

Night spills too soon, morning
evening colder now, their summer fades.
Behind baby blue blazer,
Dan Rather picks each syllable

like fish at market, red-eyed carp
left raw, washed clear in mounds of ice.
No one listens here across the river from Boston --
a man, woman, TV, blue light speechless.

Dan Rather says, "The extravaganza in
Tiananmen was the climax of a day
of highly organized activities."
Plaster lips shape the words

his frozen face has blushed,
each syllable melts ice cubes
to footage, tanks belly-crawling
Changan Avenue into the Square.

The man remembers
that day two weeks past martial law
they tanned body-to-body, soft ocean stones.

They met before the bloody common.
He almost stayed at home with his things
alone, television clean -- the news white china
caught under glass over there.

She tended bar weekends, days stuffed files
for Harvard Yenching Institute.
They talked enough that night
of martial law, visiting scholars,

eyes skipped from peel
bottle wrappings to barroom TV.
Two weeks later they scooped
stone plains of sand in palms.

Now their TV, across the Charles,
the fiftieth birthday of the revolution
and they say no one really died June 4th.

Dan's voice hoses blood
from stone until there's no such thing
as history. He says, "Under the watchful eye
of overhead windows, protestors voiced their anger

toward Beijing." The screen breaks blue shadows
on their faces, September windows chill
the backs of their necks. He touches her,
a moment between two breaths or blinks:

That which appears is good, she says,
and that which is good appears -- and touches him back,
secrets they finally understand,
a box for all their things. Two chairs,

two cups of tea, the television, Dan Rather:
"Fireworks in Tiananmen Square today,
but only the festive kind." Half past the hour.
Autumn air gnaws their ears, their living room

grows too cold. Breaths mingle,
with steam from their cups
with blue chill from the screen
then vanish inside the square of these four thin walls.

Copyright © Tony Triglio.






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