Edward Hopper’s Early Sunday Morning: A Collaborative Poem, by Bill Waters and Zee Zahava

Early Sunday Morning, by Edward Hopper (USA.) 1930

Edward Hopper’s Early Sunday Morning: A Collaborative Poem, by Bill Waters and Zee Zahava
 

city Sunday . . .
occupying the sidewalk
long shadows
 
outside the barber shop
my father’s ghost smokes his last cigar
 
open window --
an Italian aria
on the record player
 
thin walls --
my next door neighbour has a cold
achoooooooo!
 
behind shop windows
only darkness
 
city Sunday . . .
into the shadows
a black cat vanishes
 
 
Bill Waters (stanzas 1, 3, 5)
Zee Zahava (stanzas 2, 4, 6)
 
 
Bill Waters is a longtime writer of short poetry and compressed prose. He also runs the Poetry in Public Places Project, a Facebook / real-world group interested in creating and promoting poetry in public spaces to increase the richness of everyday life. Bill lives in Pennington, New Jersey, U.S.A., with his wonderful wife and their two amazing cats.
 
Zee Zahava was born in the Bronx but has lived most of her adult life in Ithaca, New York. She was the Tompkins County Poet Laureate in 2017 and 2018. Her book of short poems, here i am, was published by wildflower poetry press in 2017.