With the 50th anniversary of the assassination of former US president John F Kennedy prompting a flurry of new books, television programs and conspiracy theories, InDaily today features a poem by Poet’s Corner editor John Miles which was first published 20 years ago.
Dallas
Is that an empty limo that waits for me?
Go Jacqui Lee, tell them I have a headache today.
Bunk to motorcades, when
we get to the hotel let’s
take tea out on the terrace,
continue last night’s talk,
we’re getting somewhere at last.
Will this ’plane ever put down?
here come those Fed guys down the aisle again,
think they’re looking after me,
promises promises, I saw them all
go out last night
chasing tail and Fort Worth hooch,
what a laugh, all bunched up in that bus
and those dicky suits and ties,
looked like they were off to a briefing,
out till 3 a.m.
O Jacqui, to hell and back with motorcades,
this feels like four headaches –
here we are we’re coming in, touchdown,
welcome to Dallas, Mrs Kennedy,
pop pop, pop pop, sounded like the tyres,
must be my ears,
sounded like – back when me and Bobby
were boys in Pocasset town that summer
the hotel burnt down, all the bottles exploding,
the summer when there were more bluebacks
off Martha’s Vineyard than could be
remembered since whaling days.
O, last night my love I had a dream
and we were away from all this, still
in Texas mind, but out there on the prairie
and it was spring not fall
and all the bluebonnets were in bloom
and we sat on a grassy knoll
and drank our picnic wine
but then, then the dream changed
to back in town
and I saw you walk past the hotel
and I leant out the window
and called, but you did not hear,
just pointed, to an empty limo at the kerb,
whilst floating gently down on the morning air
came some shreds of tomorrow’s news.
“Dallas”, by John Miles, was first published 1993 in the collection He Dances, Garravembi Press, Melbourne.
Readers’ original and unpublished poems up to 30 lines can be emailed, with postal address, to [email protected]. A poetry book will be awarded to each contributor.
