Robert Mitchum was a poet? The poems of Robert Mitchum

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cabo San Lucas

Rising early to beat the heat

a little dry from last nights booze.

We’re soon out miles from land where

the big fish roam under the sun

and stars, undisturbed by time’s

wave-measured march.

Slicing bonito for bait, the blood is

red against all the blue. Blue above

and below. The hook, hungering for

meat, shines blue in my hand as

I drop its feathered plume into the wake.

We drink beer and wait for the line to sing,

rattling off the reel like a runaway train,

tightening under the drag, burning the leather stop.

The marlin leaps, its bill skewering the sky,

carves and dances in the blue, then twists and dives.

The rod quivers in the belt. Leather biting my back

I reel and pull, the marlin leaps again,

I heave forward and rare back as fire

sweat and salt gather on my skin

A moment’s slack, a shake, the fish is free.

Why aren’t all losses as lovely as this?

Quien sabe?

For Reagan

He’ll go far, of that I’m sure

since grease and a smile

will get you a mile in this town.

People love him, but what do

they know? He’s just another

B-grade star with an A-grade grin

and a glad-hand ready for

any and all.

Fuck them all, I say. Only a few

here are worth their salaries

and the rest are mannequins

dressed for the window show.

Jesus, maybe New York was the

place, but I’d miss the beach and

the sunsets here. I’m damn lucky

even if I can’t have it all.

Out of the Past

These hills, that ocean out there, the sun

heating these roadstered streets at

noon where the young and the beautiful

pass me with their eyes empty of light

but filled with the darkness of longing.

Too often I’ve lost myself in them,

swallowed the dark draught and followed

them west, under the setting moon

to the edge of the world and oblivion

until the sun again ripples the air

above these roadstered streets

and dressed in someone elses clothes

I rise to become whoever I may be today.

The Rain

I hate the rain here. On location we’re

knee deep in fake blood and mud

and the asshole director with no soul

calls for us to make another take.

I’m going leave this all soon,

all the celebrity with its paper-moon

love and bulb popping phoniness.

There’s no space for anything but loneliness.

Sarah Vaughn 

I took the A-train uptown to hear her sing,

she said I’d be safe going in with her

but man, the looks I got. And all around

everyone looking so fine and cool

and eyes flashing out of those dark

spaces, filled with things I’ll never know.

And when she sang, it was like the moon

melting down, white pearls and black satin

and a sudden silence that only she could bring.

And Thunder Road….

Jimmy was slim.

I had a belly.

Lana Turner is dead.

And so’s Grace Kelly.

What does it matter

Fast or slow

Thunder Road

Or Vertigo?