Saul Bennett
Van Gogh's 'Boats at Saintes-Maries'
Hunched on the waiting room cracked leather sofa, fearing
Doc's merciless shrieking pulley drill this wet War afternoon,
your 10-year-old tonnage sinking slowly
below his dim fluorescent moons;
Doc for hours invisibling you for grownups, comics
all read twice, nothing to do but stare at those boats
on his wall beached off a plate of China Sea
restaurant lobster goo;
shark-shape boats,
with a whale's huge double-eye
each side, masts stripped naked of sail; Doc shocking
finally with a yank instead of the promised fill;
your dopey dazed head just hanging,
blood thimbling down the side of the dime-fare
double-decker brake-farting you home too late to catch
Hop Harrigan or Captain Midnight save America on the radio.