24. GEORGE WASHINGTON IRVING HOWE

GEORGE WASHINGTON IRVING HOWE:

It is said that Washington marched through here with his troops -

I'd suppose at the head at the head on his horse

looking narrowly down while while trying to figure out something -

something to do somewhere to go someplace for hiding

from the battered ramparts of Brooklyn Heights

(as today it is known)

and the high-top fortress the redoubt of old Fort Lee -

Fort Lee where the rocks are heavy and wide and broad

and broaden too they do over the river beneath them

and the tired ragged troops were unsettled

unsettled were they as the pace of their feet

- slowing sluggish and sad - marched trod marched on

ahead ahead even of them themselves.
I don't often pay attention to attention anymore to Washington -

seems he's been everywhere around here and I've tired of that :

Trenton and Washington's Crossing and all that too -

been there for the moments been there for the due -

and those big-looking boats which were really quite small -

cannons and horses and mounts-pieces all -

there's not more to say to say more wouldn't pay

and it's ever it's ever over before it even starts

and mythology like this (I say)

doesn't really cut it any more.