Nighthawks- Again, by Michael Lewis-Beck

Nighthawks, by Edward Hopper (USA) 1942

Nighthawks- Again
 
I can’t look at Nighthawks—again. 
I mean again and again. 
I mean I can 
but it’s like the French say, 
de trop, trop traité, 
too treated, trop trafiqué, like 
drug traffic, 
promising an inner beam 
but into the nothingness 
instead of the light, into that terrible 
fluorescent gaze from nowhere. 
 
I’m not trying to sound like Ferlinghetti 
or Sartre or some Kerouac roadie. 
The scene I’ve seen de trop, 
so much I don’t SEE it. 
 
But I’ve tasted it, 
the acid-percolated coffee. 
 
I’ve felt it, 
the bad date who stares straight ahead. 
 
I’ve touched it, 
my father’s old felt hat, empty. 
 
I’ve smelled it, 
cook’s sweaty palms. 
 
Endless waiting for the light that never comes 
and never leaves. 
 
Michael Lewis-Beck

Mike Lewis-Beck writes from Iowa City.  He has pieces in American Journal of Poetry, Apalachee Review, Cortland Review, Chariton Review, Ekphrastic Review, Guesthouse, Pilgrimage, Taos Journal of International Poetry and Art, and Wapsipinicon Almanac, among other venues. He has a book of poems, Rural Routes, recently published by Alexandria Quarterly Press.