Finnegans Wake


Every two weeks my husband and I 
take the train to the city
to unravel what James Joyce wrote.

Our fellow readers: a retired academic who plays jazz, 
an actor, a former police administrator, a translator.
All of us in love with the great writer’s puns,

allusions, off-color jokes, obscure 
mythic references, Irish history. 
Sometimes, we finish two paragraphs,

then read to each other aloud.
What better way to while away 
these late years I tell myself.

Waiting for the group to begin 
at a Jane Street apartment,
I sip a cappuccino at a table in the little park 

off 8th Avenue, maybe overdressed 
in bright magenta blouse and grey pin-striped suit, 
that matches my hair that grew back grey.

I hand my husband my iPhone
to take a photo of me. 
He fumbles for the setting, allergic to technology.

I post the picture on Facebook.
Comments come, “You look so sophisticated.”
I hardly recognize myself.