Poems After Edward Hopper, by Marko Capoferri

Cape Cod Evening, by Edward Hopper (USA) 1939

​Edward Hopper, Cape Cod Evening (1939, oil on canvas, 30 x 40 in.)
 
We build up our muscles 
for waiting. And what it is
 
that time adds up to still
hasn’t showed. I’ll be
 
the silence that hides
inside the storm. You be
 
the connective tissue
that tenses its sinew into
 
twilight’s superlative
giving-way.

Summer Evening, by Edward Hopper (USA) 1947

​Edward Hopper, Summer Evening (1947, oil on canvas, 30 x 42 in.)
 
The breath comes 
at its intervals, like distances. 
 
An ingratiating posture
towards others has been,
 
and continues to be, a front.
Not falsehood, but like weather
 
changes from dusk 
to dusk, an appetite for blinding 
 
the horizon, which means
just another kind of horizon. 

Shakespeare at Dusk, by Edward Hopper (USA) 1935

​Edward Hopper, Shakespeare at Dusk (1935, oil on canvas, 17 x 25 in.)
 
Define horizon. An anecdote. 
Exoskeleton. Bestiary of lost idols. 
 
Excuse for an absence. The hive
hunting its bees. Outer limit
 
of an echo, where the story
ratchets back more unsure 
 
than when it left. Still pond
waiting for a pebble. Answer
 
in search of a question to make
it whole, to make it home. 

Excursion into Philosophy, by Edward Hopper (USA) 1959

​Edward Hopper, Excursion into Philosophy (1959, oil on canvas, 30 x 40 in.)
 
Last time I wrote down the date I was saving
something from extinction, from instinct.
 
And as day throws itself again into its own
fire there on the hill, trying to stay warm and
 
losing badly, I decide to stop trying for preservation.
I forget the plot leads, inexorably, here to a man 
 
by a window trying to own a sliver of a world
that stays unowned, unbridled horse headed
 
for the hills and the thick grass there
leaning east against the turning earth. 

Old Ice Pond at Nyack, by Edward Hopper (USA) 1897

​Edward Hopper, Old Ice Pond at Nyack (1897, oil on canvas, 11 3/4 x 19 3/4 in.)
 
Strictly speaking it is winter
inside the mind, where all things 
 
beg for more. The ground 
is choiceless. Wherever 
 
a voice stuns into speech 
there’s singing under the eaves. 
 
Icicles tremble with
an inkling, like the teeth 
 
of some dog that can’t stop 
dreaming of the chase. 
 
Marko Capoferri 
 
Marko Capoferri is a poet, musician, occasional journalist, and former conservation worker. He has lived and worked in eight US states, including Montana, where he has lived since 2015. He received an MFA from the University of Montana. His poems have recently appeared in Sequestrum, The Shore, and Stoneboat Literary Journal. On a good weekend, you will find him in a Western Montana bar playing rock and roll 'til the wee hours of the morning.