Meeting Ginsberg
by Catherine Taylor

    I should have shook the hand of greatness
    when I had the chance when he stood before
    me frail bodied septuagenarian dark suit
    cashmere scarf reflecting silver grizzled facial
    hair a few feet away he stood pursing his thick
    ruby lips spectacles hanging low on his rounded
    ethnic elderly nose and his eyes glowed and shown
    on all he loved and he seemed to love the whole
    human race and I could have stepped up and reached
    out and he would have taken my inexperienced hand
    in his callused one and squeezed
    how well I know where those hands have been
    how many young men they have embraced in
    the name of love lust knowledge in the search for
    poetry
    those hands that embraced kerrouac and ferrlinghetti
    thich nhat hanh and mother theresa that held back
    protesters in chicago prayed for peace in dc that
    caressed his squeezebox like they caressed my fingers
    he would have looked me in the eye as an equal a poet
    not unlike him a kindred spirit who reels and rails
    against the horrors of the world and prays openly for
    goodness peace equality a fellow lover touching him
    searching for the subatomic certainty of truth of
    poetry

    but instead I stood back watching
    his words and music his gentle voice still
    echoing in my mind watching wondering how
    one so godlike got to be so old and
    mortal






Copyright © 2024 by Red River Review. First Rights Reserved. All other rights revert to the authors.
No work may be reproduced or republished without the express written consent of the author.