The Day Chandler Died
after Frank O’Hara
I drink a cocktail with an orange
slice moon on the roof terrace
of our hotel and watch the street
sellers in Piazza della Rotonda throw
blue lights high and one lands
on the dome opposite and pulses
in the gutter going going gone
then the American lady in pyjamas
comes up for her 8pm roll-up
and we take the elevator down
and outside dolphins gush
and Maggie nearly gets
knocked down by a Piaggio –
she is on her phone –
and she says Matthew Perry
is dead and I think
could that be any more sad
then we walk to Ivo for pizza
and watch the one where
he meets Jill Goodacre
in a vestibule and I text
the boys don’t swim on your own
after dark and I cry a little
because the funny guy
shouldn’t stage exit first
and on the way back Maggie
does a cartwheel in the Pantheon
portico and I imagine soft
rain falling like glitter on its marble
floor and how even in the dark
it would look like there is a light on inside
*
Eithne Longstaff is originally from the North of Ireland and now lives in England. She is studying for an MA in Creative Writing and her poems have been published in Dreich and online in Rattle and The Ekphrastic Review.
