I lost my Magritte hat today,
my favorite black bowler,

lifted off my head by a gray wind.
I watched it tumble up

from the wet night street,
above bright lampposts

toward the blue morning sky,
dotted with white-puff clouds,

past the array of floating men,
until it reached the place

between birds and not-birds,
sprouted wings and soared away.

I checked my flaccid watch,
that ticked persistently, like my memory.

Lighting my pipe I like to call “fish”,
I strolled the dark boulevard.

A girl emerged from the arched shadows,
rolling a hoop.

I watched her, expressionless
with my green apple face.

You may think this was all a dream,
but I say to you, it was

real, sir, real.

03/11/2002

Posted on 03/11/2002
Copyright © 2026 Bruce W Niedt