The Danube glitters and toils just beyond the walnut trees. The Great Writer sits at ease among blooms and disciples. A garden with an old man — younger men drinking his wine; his voice is slow and benign, the others pause to listen. When he has nothing to say he smiles, and sniffs a pink rose that straggles near his nose. Sometimes he closes one eye. His wife, in her painting-smock, serves us hors d'oeuvres and tidbits. She bustles about, then sits to chatter and have a smoke. How idyllic, how humane! I think, testing the thought: — for such scenes are dearly bought when foreign troops ring a town. Betrayals, maybe, and lies earned them a peaceful old age; chewing lox I try to gauge the character of each face. But I don't know the language, and they're all strangers to me. Everybody looks guilt-free, sunlit near the water's edge. I included, it must be, as I stare at the old man like some homage-heavy fan silenced by proximity. Calmed by thoughts that I too wear the double-dealer's false face, I begin to like the place, and move out from my corner. With the interpreter's help I talk of Art in the West for a charming poet-guest who downs vodka at a gulp.
Copyright © 1978 by Tony Connor. Appears courtesy of the author.