"independence" and "after the last one"

independence

you colorfully decorate
the times before history
chalk them up to guys
with fringes on their shoulders

you draw epaulettes
horses flying
to the caves of
robot dragons

you cozy up to anyone
stepping off a freight train
with a patch above their hearts

yet there is no news
you could hand out
to your local pitchman

 


 

after the last one

he lowers the boom gate

steps between the tracks
stares at the landscape
above the contact area of the tracks
moves backwards
as if something were approaching
but it’s only a flash of light

he raises the boom gate

hangs his hat
on the cranker
next to his epaulettes

contemporary human trash
covers the railroad gravels
he stands above them

no more train is coming

 

 

Gabor G Gyukics

Gabor G Gyukics (b. 1958) is a Hungarian-American poet, jazz poet, literary translator born in Budapest. He is the author of 11 books of original poetry, 6 in Hungarian, 2 in English, 1 in Arabic, 1 in Bulgarian, 1 in Czech and 16 books of translations including A Transparent Lion, selected poetry of Attila József and Swimming in the Ground: Contemporary Hungarian Poetry (in English, both with co-translator Michael Castro) and an anthology of North American Indigenous poets in Hungarian titled Medvefelhő a város felett. He writes his poems in English (which is his second language) and Hungarian. His latest book in English is a hermit has no plural (Singing Bone Press, 2015). His latest book in Hungarian was published by Lector Press in May 2018. Photo by Sándor Gyapjas.

 

Edited for Unlikely by Jonathan Penton, Editor-in-Chief
Last revised on Wednesday, November 2, 2016 - 22:52