Solicitations from a Street Corner
Near Columbia University, 2006

for Kenneth Koch

By Brent McCafferty

Kenneth Koch, just where do you think
you're headed with my escritoire in hand, and the ink
bottle I keep for my quill pen? I suppose
you know
someone who'd like to take us for a drink

later — perhaps you and John Ashbery,
Larry Rivers, Frank O'Hara. Apprise my secretary
we're going toping and I'll meet
you at a downtown fête
Jay Z's hosting at the 40/40. Oh you know him very

well, do you? Is he not a complex
sensation? Both angel- and devil-borne? Let's
ask Biggie to come along,
too — that way I can get someone to sing
backup on "Mo Money, Mo Problems." No? The multiplex

it is, then! They're showing a revue
of old movies at the Cine Plaza and popcorns're two
for ten dollars. Yes, I'm buying.
No, I'm not trying
to flatter you, Ken, don't you

know you're one of the great exemplar
poets? Reverie: you and Robert Bly in a T-car
at 75 and we just cruise
for hours up to
Vermont or Manitoba where

there're thousands of spangly
girls singly
devoted not to our pleasure
but to beating us at a fierce game of cards. I measure
you out a fifth of bourbon and Robert, he

tells
us about a trip he took in a caravel
to the south of Spain
and I say,
"You pair are the two most gentle,

humane, ebullient
people I've ever met" — and I will've meant
it. We'll stay up writing poetry
till dawn in a contest to see
who can pen

the best verse;
I won't win, of course:
Robert, you've got God
on your side, and Ken, you've passed, so you've probably snookered God
too by now. Me, I'm averse

to religion, though raised Baptist —
anyway, I admire you all the same and it's
of no consequence. So we can
go driving, Ken?
Would you endeavor a short tryst

with a lover
of your work? Sure, I'll aver
that rap isn't the greatest art form: we'll turn Jay
way
down on the trip back. Where

do you want me to pick you up, The Drake?
The Belvedere? The Michelangelo? Central Park?
Mandarin Oriental? Staten Island Ferry? The Carlyle?
Grand Central? Madame Tussaud's? The Lowell?
Frick Collection? Time Warner Center? Schomberg Center for Research in Black

Culture? Japan Society? Broadway?
Shea
Stadium? The Met? Saks?
Go on now! Let's take off and jaunt! It strikes
me Ken, that you'll never stop loving this big! bright! barmy! city! — New York City!