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The Night John Lennon DiedAuthor(s): David HellmanSource: The North American Review, Vol. 290, No. 6 (Nov. - Dec., 2005), p. 36Published by: University of Northern IowaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25127483 .

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N A R

DAVID HELLMAN

The Night John Lennon Died

my brother in a shiva of strangers stared at the stone face of the Dakota?

72nd and Central Park West?not knowing why he was there. I was on the East Side

of the world, waking to the pounding of teakwood

wheels against the potholed earth

road to Doi Nok?mountain

with a hump like a Brahman bull.

Brahman bulls and bullock carts all morning plied the road, buried in dust like snow. Dry season, land

crabs from the sun hid under rice paddies

cracked, dry. At dusk, the wheels

carted payloads of Doi Nok

firewood. Stars burned so close you could smell them.

MATTHEW ST. AMAND

Job Application? Minna Construction

Please accept this prose poem as a request for employment with your company as court writer, stenographer,

poet, and balladeer. I have impeccable personal hygiene, quick reflexes, I'm punctual, observant, have my own

vehicle, take few sick days, and make friends easily. I know how to help by staying out of the way. My sense of

humor has been described as "off color" and "obscure," however, my daily manner of speech is laden with

profanity. I'm an avid watcher of the TV show COPS, which aids me in relating to the common man.

Why would a construction company need a poet? Because throwing a handful of coins behind nearly finished

walls doesn't do justice to the feat of Building. I will write epic poems about your skill and tenacity (Petrarchan sonnets are my specialty), about the vagaries of weather, temperature, and terrain on which you work. I will sing odes during lunch breaks. I'll go out for coffee and sandwiches. I'll produce a monograph dedicated to the band

of brothers, to their nail guns and dirty boots when the job is finished. To their camaraderie. And when we

repair to the neighborhood tavern for ale and spirits, I will regale patrons with tales of nails and wood, drywall and tear-dampened cement. I will produce what your sweaty brows, dirty hands, and two-by-fours will not:

life everlasting.

ELISABETH MURAWSKI

The Girl from Vietnam

She's thin as a heron in slacks, backless

stiletto 4-inch heels.

If she spoke, the music in her tongue

would be its own

enchantment: songbirds

billeted in the trees.

She slips from view,

passes through a door

and leaves the air glowing as a Corot,

bud, blossom, fruit

completing the cycle in one moment

free of enemy fire,

evoking a harbor

with red sails, jeweled oars,

the moon and stars

the sky's only searchlights sweeping Saigon.

36 NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW November-December 2005

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