Classic Poem

[for Ranbir Kaleka]

The greenest things happen when you're not looking:
creepers braid themselves around a bridge,
clouds surround a tower, nudge it towards a dead end
and neon measures the length of the cobbled street.
There's no one to hear you read, clearly it's time
to jump off the mind's cold waterfront

and follow the dolphins, whose dance lasts as long
as a notched breath, the naked spasm of a thought,
the yanking away of a hand. You could miss it
so easily and freeze. Is that you or a cut-out
parked in your chair? How wise to plant a proxy:
the greenest things happen when you're not there.