Mark Terrill
In the Albert Cuypstraat Gracefully auditioning for my attention in the street in Amsterdam at the Albert Cuyp outdoor market the big herons so contrapuntally out of context stalking boldly on stick-like yellow legs there between the fish stalls soggy cardboard boxes and garbage in anticipation of a fallen fish head or a string of bloody intestines before swooping up over the rooftops and returning to their hungry broods—their breast feathers a hoary garland ruffled in the early morning breeze dark shiny eyes looking out from beyond the last primordial wisdom with airs of stoic avian nobility—and like a rusty boxcar I am shunted through various stations of psychic transmigration in awe of the herons’ bravado and their cool calculated temerity and Darwinian ability to adapt while at the same time fearing for their fate hanging naked in the balance for all to see like van Gogh’s ear outside the bordello just before a drunken Gauguin lopped it off with a clumsy swoosh of his fencing sword and sailed off to Tahiti leaving van Gogh to make up the story about the razor and self-mutilation while Rachel the prostitute took the bloody ear she had been lovingly bestowed with and tossed it in the garbage with an impetuous flick of her fine-boned wrist.
Up on the Hill 102 |
Up on the hill I’m heading into the post office but first I have to step around this older couple in their eighties or so just on their way out now standing outside the entrance & as I look at them in passing I see that he’s dressed in an old beret & gold-rimmed glasses & corduroy jacket & jeans with both hands gripping the handles of one of those walkers-on-wheels that old folks sometimes have & I glance over at her & see she’s wearing a hat & jacket & white ruffled blouse & a skirt & leaning on a gnarly old wooden cane & together they make a fine picture of elderly dignified sophistication that contrasts sharply with all the farmers & local yokels going in & out of the bakery & the post office & right away I feel a sudden surge of empathy for them & am not even perturbed or bent out of shape because they’re standing there clogging up the entrance & just as I’m stepping around them I see the woman looking up at the man with a weird vacant expression & she rolls her eyes & then shuts them & reaches out with a shriveled trembling liver-spotted hand & grasps one of the handles of his walker-on-wheels apparently having a dizzy spell or a moment of weakness & I’m wondering if she’s about to faint & whether or not I’m going to have to get involved but then she’s just standing there with her eyes shut collecting her composure & gathering her strength before continuing on & in that very moment as I’m passing behind her I look into the man’s face to see how he’s reacting & dealing with the situation & in the few intervening milliseconds that pass I simultaneously see the deeply felt concern that a loving trusted partner has for another in such a situation as well as the obvious annoyance that is stirring in him as he thinks Oh and now she has to go and have one of her spells right here in front of the damned post office but also visible is the disconcerting naked realization of his own helplessness in the situation himself a little unsteady on his feet with both hands grasping the walker & knowingly unable to catch her if she should fall & the way all those different aspects & emotions & thoughts were all being expressed at once in the eyes & furrows & folds of his lined & weathered face & suddenly I’m choking up with the realization that that man could be me & that woman could be you & how just last weekend after seeing Zabriskie Point & we went to Vasco da Gama for dinner & you were having trouble with your circulation going all white in the face & I was already considering the possibility of leaving although we’d just snagged the best table in the totally full restaurant & no way did I want to leave & how I was feeling all those same exact things that I was now reading in the old man’s face & how that was inextricably binding