Hart Crane Poem

 

This Hart Crane documentary

 

Was made thirty years after his suicide,

When the principals, mostly writers

Were late in life, and yet, his impact

On them seemed fresh as they faced

The camera, describing him, first as

An exuberant young man who loved

Music and dancing, and taking all night.

Their 1950s’ takes on his queerness,

The power of his lyricism, then

The descent into drink—it’s a great

Show in which the subject never talks,

And then there’s Peggy Cowley

Holding a half-burned cigarette

In fingers browned from the task

And telling about the last night

On the ship, how they’d brought

Hart back to his quarters, nailed

The door shut to protect his

Drunken self from himself.

She smoked and told the tale

She’d told a thousand times.

The camera blinks and a new

Cigarette appears in her fingers.

And in her eyes, her wrinkled face,

One could see the ravaging

He’d done to his fiancée.