By Steve Luttrell

In the beginning
is the name
and the name be

Ishmael

and this man went forth
an orphan to the world
that would receive him.
The story he would tell,
one of fate and retribution.

It was a hard world then,
where men would come together
to chart a common course
and with no care for prophecy
to take the devil’s coin.
A crew of men to man and sail
the whaler named

The Pequod

Sailing out from salt–stained
old “Nantuck”
with its captain so named

Ahab

at the helm.
A captain known to all
with a vengeance in his blood
for that curse–born whale
that glides the valleys
of the deep,
the one they’ve come to call

Moby–Dick.

A giant white Leviathan,
a harbinger of death,
all scarred and stuck
with harpoons forged in blood.
This captain would have only
one intention
to find and kill that damn

White Whale

that had left him as a
peg–leg from a previous encounter
but in the end, the whale
would win the day
and take that fated captain on
his last Nantucket sleigh–ride
while pinned to his side
like a bloody harpoon.

He was one now
with the giant white whale
Moby–Dick
on his descent to
the depths of a watery grave
with only Ishmael
left to tell the tale
of that great white whale.

And so it comes to be
until the sea gives up her dead
on that final day of judgment.

–Finis–

Moby–Dick: Warner Bros, 1956

By Gerard Malanga

Inge’s foto of Garbo grabbed in profile
in mostly shades of gray
barely hints the time of day
it might’ve been taken; say
around 4: an undisclosed street comer midtown Manhattan.
Obsessed in remaining unrecognized
in surroundings as mistaken as she.
A city in the throes
of constantly deleting its history. The mindset of those
moments to wanna lose oneself
in the crowd of likewise anonymities;
the untold stories forever untold.
The whizzing cars, the rushhour shadows.
The end–of–day quiet alone in your thoughts.
Or the one person at a street comer
waiting for the light to change and going her way.
It could’ve been anyone. The soul a little less so.

By Gerard Malanga

Pierre,
You came & went.
A wake of silences abound.
Your voice–over lost among the pitter–patter rain against the café
window.
Our eyes crossed
each other on the wet–laden street.
Was this Paris ? Yes,
it feels like Paris attacked by autumn winds & greyless skies.
A chill enshrined by hands in pockets, mohair scarves.
I’d assumed you were still living on the rue de Seine, nearest to}
the Seine.
Those craggy, narrow sunless streets.
We shared café crème at the Flore, reminiscing names.
The rain never seeming to let up,
drumming on the outstretched awning,
unremarkabilities our reveries bestowed.

By Gerard Malanga

Exactly what happened next and why are not clear.
The late afternoon light simply skittered up the side
of a wall in the kitchen. The voices of children commingling,
though the soundtrack abruptly drops off.
So what’s heard can only be faintly imagined.
There was a slight chill in the air now.
There was a hollow cooing.
There were even backlit billowing trees and a low rustle.
No longer the cat’s eyes glowing in the dark,
no longer faces lit up in the dark. The wintry barks
chipped away. A child peering in from nowhere.
Is it the last season for things pulling out of focus? Damn!
A diaphanous curtain furls and unfurls.
Linen piled up on a chair and the emptiness
soon soon forgotten. Someone is taking a nap
and for once the screendoor remains silent.
Then the silhouette of a branch gently sways
on the opposite wall. A dizzying script scratches
its way into darkness.