Crane

Tonight I want to return to Elizabeth,

New Jersey, where Stephen Crane lies

under a stone, and my father,

after twenty years of skimping wages, finally

opened his own dry-goods store.

I worked there after school, on weekends,

but it didn't take a genius to see

from the sad look of the place—

dim light, threadbare "goods"—where it was headed.

In all the time I spent in that smog-sucking town

of wan bargain hunters and hangdog merchants,

I never knew of, let alone visited,

Crane's grave. Then, I was more enamored of

that other Crane, Hart (lovely name!),

whose grave is in the belly of the South Atlantic.

Besides, I couldn't imagine any reason why

anyone would want to stop off, never mind

die, in Elizabeth, New Jersey. It seemed

nobody there cared about, much less

knew, the color of the sky.