Walking by a flea market in Pest.
Walking by its table of late Eighties Soviet chic, in pieces.
Some old movies begin as a cheesy map
gone up in flames to quick-start
real people talking, in trouble, if-in-fact.
True or false, the backstory all over again. Yes, we backstory,
you backstory, I backstory….
Russian medals, insignia,
military whatnots, uniform caps for sale—
memorabilia = cherished, no matter what. No matter
that soldiers too young on their glad
desperate way out of history stripped down
right on the streets of Budapest.
After all, worth a few HUFs, that stuff, said one of us
alive and well, his childhood staring
wide-eyed straight at me.
I could see the ten-year-old he’d been, shrunk down
to bigger now.
Netherworld
come closer. The scattering—
worn passports on that table too, covers ragged, bent—
blue, maroon, black. Bulgaria, Albania,
Romania, Czechoslovakia…. So forth and so on.
Smoke, fire—
little squares inside, blurred
I froze into and
stop there
