DC PLACES ISSUE
Terence Winch
CATHEDRAL
It is a perfect day to remember your belly,
the religious façade of your shimmering white
surrender on the sidewalk in front of the deli
on R Street, where I held you tight.
You used to sit at a little table, a pink
book about Picasso in your lap, a doctrinaire
look in your eye. I bought you a drink
and later took you to my lair.
The exchange was extraordinarily complex.
Brutal myths became so colorfully private.
Your lips, your lips, your lips—I took sex
from everything you looked at, everything you ate.
Then those small, pink Picassos caught up with us.
A new air, a new light gave us a sense
of perfection. I began to notice how the focus
blurred, how lyrical was my embrace of absence.
Terence Winch's most recent book is That Special Place: New World Irish Stories, a collection of non-fiction pieces growing out of his life as a musician. He is also the author of three books of poems, The Drift of Things (The Figures, 2001), The Great Indoors (Story Line Press, 1995, winner of the Columbia Book Award), and Irish Musicians/American Friends (Coffee House Press, 1985, winner of an American Book Award), and a book of short fiction, Contenders. His work also appears in numerous journals, such as The Paris Review and American Poetry Review, and anthologies, including three Best American Poetry collections and the new Oxford Book of American Poetry. He has been the recipient of a poetry grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. Also a musician and songwriter, Winch recorded three albums, all featuring his compositions, with Celtic Thunder, an Irish band he co-founded in 1977. His web site is: www.terencewinch.com.
Published in Volume 7, Number 3, Summer 2006.
To read more by this author:
Terence Winch
Terence Winch: Poets in Federal Government Issue