~DANIEL
TOBIN~
THE
HOUSE
Here, where the paved ridge declines
into the bay,
what I keep coming back to is a
building,
its blunt facade storied with brick,
latticed with fire-escapes—a monument
to function. Whatever dull
architect
raised this box above the dwindling
farms
of a city spreading to the Island
was pleased to be paid and let it
blend
into the flow, block on block of
apartments,
rowhouses crowding to pristine lawns
along the shore: though I loved
the wrought iron doors outside the
foyer,
between each grille a painted-over
flower,
on every pane of glass a scratched-in
name
or emblem embossed in magic marker
to preserve a life from the illegible:
carved plaster, affectations of marble,
the long hallway devoid of furniture
where I'd hurl my pink "Spauldeen,"
hearing its report echo up the floors.
I'd watch for the landlord, Mr.
Johnson,
who changed his name from the Greek,
on patrol in his great brown coat.
Now, stiff as washed-up actors at
a call,
the others come, passing from the
numbered
honeycomb of their rooms: Astrid
and Gunnar,
crew-cut jutting off his head, his
hands
a prizefighter's. His wife,
her breath
hinting of drink, used to slip me
quarters
on the stairs. Frances and
Tony lived
above the alley, their door always
ajar.
Tuscanies of sauce drifted into
the hall
with smoke from Tony's panatellas.
Each week
they'd have us over to play Po-Ke-No,
Frances calling cards, her rough
contralto
throaty as Bacall's. And "Skinny
Jeannie,"
who'd hunt the avenue for bargains.
She'd coif
her hair to a stiffened hive and
brag
of her virginity. Madeleine
lived over her.
With her French page-boy and porcelain
face,
she looked a nun and talked of nothing
but finding a husband. Old
Mr. Walsh
who limped since the War.
The man
we called The Farmer who stalked
the yard
with his owlish stare. Bobby
Carney
who came back from Vietnam, my mother
said,
"a little off." Crazy Kathryn
who sang
show tunes in the hall. My
own family
pent in our four rooms. I can
see us all
climbing the last flight to the
roof
the night the city turned blank
as a screen.
In that blackness, the stars visible
above our cramped antennas, everyone
went quiet. We listened to
ships sounding
on the Narrows like voices through
a wall,
the muffled promise of lives beyond
our own.
© by Daniel Tobin
