The Millennial Pedestrian: Poems About Walking Around in Central Park and Other Places

By John Schenck

In these compelling, conversational poems, John Schenck takes you to familiar places, then shows them to you in an entirely new way. As he guides you from the Great Lawn in New York's Central Park to a carpet-seller's shop in Cappadocia, Schenck will show you how to see, hear and simply notice the world with fresh eyes and ears.

The Millennial Pedestrian is more than a travelogue in verse. Memory, regret and moments of joy mingle in poems about love, death and the relentless passage of time. Friendship is celebrated, love honored, and sadness given its inevitable due.

In every poem, the poet's voice is clear, friendly and direct, sharing a story with you that's as much yours as it is his. These are poems to enjoy in your own quiet moments. But you will want to read them aloud to someone else, so the poet's voice can speak through you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jan 18, 2005
• ISBN: 9780595788019

John Schenck

John Schenck was born in 1943 in Mt. Kisco, NY. It was not until 1997 that he came to verse when he enrolled in his college classmate William Matthews?s graduate poetry workshop at City College in New York City. Since then he has worked on his poetry with Judith Baumel, Molly Peacock, Kate Light, Phillis Levin and Charles Martin. ?Many of these poems are about walking around in New York and a few other places,? says Schenck, ?but they?re mainly about walking around in your own mind and paying attention to what you find there?in memory and in the way you respond when your surroundings speak to you.? ?Poetry is a way of taking notes?of noticing. And then of choosing your words as carefully as you can to describe what you?ve seen and heard.? During the daytime, Schenck works as a copywriter and creative director in magazine publishing.

Book preview

Contents

Introduction

Air Chime

Memory Drips Like Water ThroughLimestone

Manicure

CuL-de-Sac

Cop Car

B-17

Albert Bertel Thorvaldsen(Danish sculptor, 1776-1844)

Circle Line

August Sunday Morning

Baseball Swallow

Cleopatra’s Needle

January Thaw

March Rain

Millennial Pedestrian

No One on Shore

The Sign

The Great Lawn

Stieglitz Takes a Picture at SunnysideYards

Shadows

Quassapaug

Thunderstorm: Chatham, New York

Elevator Dream

Contrail

Deep Thoughts

Evening on the Esopus River

Photograph of a Rectangular VaseIllustrating Poem by Tao Qian

Conception of the Fibonaccifor Judith Baumel

Arts & Leisure Ghazal(Opening couplet by Charles Martin)

Greenland

Lake Star

Litchfield Hills

I rise, go to the window,see the moon rise, coldover stubbled fieldsrimed silver by the frost,over the barns and houses,over the hills, black and silent.

On the Knowledge of Dogs

Lycia

Old Dreams

Anatolian Compost

The Antique Theater of Kas

The Merchant

The Ruined Castle of Vysehrad

Two Views of Chartres: November ‘75

Shoreliner

Take One Step

Open to Everything

The Bayman

Driving in the Strong Moonlightof the 1999 Winter Solstice

The Coming of the Light

The Gray Stripe

Witnesses

TransformationsFor Liz and Josh

To:

This book is especially dedicated to the late William Matthews: college classmate,

friend, and my first poetry mentor; and also to these other exceptional New York poets

who have helped me find my way: Judith Baumel, Molly Peacock, Kate Light, Phillis

Levin and Charles Martin; and to Holly, with love and gratitude; and also to Liz,

Will, Chip and Ted, who helped me grow up.

Introduction

Ever since 1971, when I first moved toNew York City from the suburbs, Central Park has been my back yard. For awhile it was pretty ratty, as back yards go, and not a place you’d much want tovisit once the sun had set.

But even then it was a brilliant and refreshing amenity. In spring it would bethronged with people, tired of winter, who’d lie out on the new grass or the warmflat rocks by the Lake or walk in the long circles the Park offers in such abundance.

By the time I started writing poetry, in 1997, the Park was being transformedinto a lushly groomed garden. More people than ever came to visit. And its vistas,both human and natural, moved me in a way that was good for writing poems.The refreshed and renovated beauty of the Park helped me notice things that hadalways been there. The way its visitors reacted to it made me think about the wayI react to my surroundings,