SPIRES AND TUNNELS

I was born in the shadow of a mighty church

old as the town itself and as gray

Two tall spires stretched toward the sky

like the legs of a lovesick woman;

she taught us about longing, about love, about

being human, being poor, wanting what you cannot have

Now in your modern American city I write

to salute your spirit of surprise, the random core

of poets, the loyal hope of lovers, here

everything leads downward to the heart,

down to the river, down south, down to you

and down to me too in the subway tunnel.

I stand here now between two gods, belong to both

even when they quarrel. Here I will read you

not from front to back like a scholar of serious intent

or from back to front like a daughter of Israel,

but like a poet I invite the irradiant irreverence

of inconsistency and coincidence.