"City of Fire"

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CITY OF FIRE
Valentina Gnup

               for Brendan Constantine

Lost pigeons,
sky the color of smoke,
I know you the way I know Berlin—
      your desperate lies, your decency.

I see you as I see Belfast.
Notes from an oboe, your deep voice,
      city of shipyards and sadness,
your rusted bicycles, your broken laws.

Cathedrals in sharp wind, I see Paris;
      your fruit-stand optimism,
the bitchy waiter in you. Fragrance of cherry blossoms,
stench of old men’s urine—
      city of your devil laugh, your artist’s hands.

I know you as New York.
      The café where blind grandfathers
eat bagels and argue over chess,
              Sunday morning faithful
to a sugar-cube God who dissolves on your tongue,
      the way I dissolved on your tongue.

City of prostitutes sucking off soldiers,
      your tattoo parlors, your bleached hair;
I know you as I know any city—

      the promise that around the next corner
holds something lovely as a thousand origami cranes,
              something beautiful enough to enter.

      I know your city, Hollywood.
I see your thin walls, your holy ambition;
I see your blue eyes, your face painted in watercolors.

City of celebrities, city of brilliant alcoholics,
      I know you.

City of graffiti, city of fire,
              I know you—
like a city I have always lived in,
      like a city where I will never live.

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