After the Flood

CROSSING THE CHARLES BRIDGE

Imagine a tunnel of stones,

dark, insinuating, a leap of walls.

Walk through it, without blinking.

Face the rood and river, the Hrad

gardens greening on your right,

to the left a waterfall

of swans that flurry into snow.

You will know the infinite

play of spires on the sky as light.

Night on every canvas will be painted red

and day the orange of rooftops.

Imagine every vine a map, every bridge

a branch to walk the Moldau larch

into the sun side of beauty.

Do not give in to blinking

or to thinking golems on the stair.

Imagine Kafka here at dusk, asleep

in the carrels of the Clementinum,

or sipping absinthe with Apollinaire,

or Seifert on the tram to Slavie,

every word a crick of tracks.

Imagine the river now dividing

wealth with nimble hands, underwater,

the waste-rake of shores it hones and laves,

Libussa’s olive trees at dawn,

a century of breath falling awake.

Imagine Havel with the sword of Bruncvik

stretching arms and legs

on the steps from Melantrich

to climb the Goldmaker’s Alley,

the ghost of the Vltava River at his back.

*

WHEN THE RIVER RISES

For Prague underwater, August 12, 2002

When the river rises, a quail will lose its way

to diminution. The Kampa cove

creates a creek, trees are bushes, and islands

cupolas on which to gauze a wing.

When the river rises, the Charles Bridge

bellies down on legs, the stubbled arch

falls lame, and littered logs drift round

the carp and barges. A roof and crow

will sink in tow like pods to stems

when the river rises. And where St. Vitus spires

in their mist are gliding, clouds no longer

fix their tails to the slaked Vltava.

The shore is trebled into banks.

Reflections wade, a sea is made

in solemn visits. Swans above the seine

can barely stand the current’s slubbing,

once the scuttle sinks to where the rocks

have muscled up a dam. In Prague

cobbles in the loam are freed of rain’s translation.

Earth will make its way to shore again.