Louis Stettner, Urban Traces, 79th Street, 1976 (Website)
Black and white photography, 40 x 50 cm
©The Estate of Louis Stettner, 2019
Love, the blue-brown juice that pools beneath
the smack to the ribs. Love, the file of vitals,
the bloodspot like a bad pressed flower.
Love the memory-charm, mornings
of early frost & burning red diesel—blue, brown
—a broken pipe, a bruise, a bit of ice—
love. Don’t make me again, it says. My feet
against the radiator, which worked that winter.
Love, the juice over the eyes, the cupboard-vinegar
I dashed into a pot to tang the stew. Love, the bluing, the trick
to cover evidence of stains in sheets. Love,
the bluing. Don’t make me again. Love, the arrow
that misses the heart, spills endless blue-brown
diesel gallons on the ground,
and love, the thousand, thousand years that it will take
to halve such a mistake, cover the stain; love,
the sweet liqueur that made me hesitate
to steal the matches, cinder that place; love,
the reasoning to not escape,
and when I did, love, that path to her door,
past the greenhouse where birds flew
into glass that looked like air, then lay
wide-eyed in the impatiens, as if just waking up
to a monstrous face they were compelled to yearn for.