The Rough Guide to Romantic Comedy

Boy‚ you’re in a special love‚ one that whitens teeth

and completes each other’s sentences‚ so as you walk

Central Park on the first squirrel-orange day of fall‚

There is no symbolism lost to you or the camera.

Swans partner across the lake’s rippled chrome‚

the zaftig wives in tight black couture hurry

home to the Upper East Side‚ their husbands‚

even the Guggenheim is a surrealist wedding cake

and when the kid playing bucket drums says‚

Mister‚ you sure got a fine lady‚ you think yep‚

she’s a doozy: corkscrew blond‚ MBA‚ voice like

Ma Rainey after five full tumblers of single malt.

But something’s rotten in your Bronx apartment‚

her Gordian heart‚ the cold‚ cold feet of home‚

late night calls to that old boyfriend from Tupelo.

Being‚ Heidegger once said‚ is that which is farthest.

What you are not is he‚ him‚ the shiver-down boy

in the elms of her childhood‚ the one who grows up

shirtless and on her mind with his tan biceps hunched

under the hood shadow of a tractor‚ pining away for

the day she returns to the farm‚ expectant and courtsome.

Now the camera isn’t happy. Life is rain and gray winos‚

the smell of muscatel on your stoop the afternoon you

come home from work and find she’s caught a train south‚

and before you can say cut‚ the image of him

drawling down her calico sundress plays your head.

For a week you lie in bed‚ read the longer works of Coleridge.

Enter the sidekick‚ Buddy Strong‚ the man with the plan

and a brand new Lincoln that squires you through

the bituminous hills of West Virginia‚ Kentucky‚ into

vein-blue and susurrus‚ a gunmetal pennant drowsed

over poplar‚ hickories‚ pine‚ the Natchez Trace

winding you and Buddy miles around bend after bend

until the camera focuses in on a city limit sign:

Welcome to Tupelo‚ Original Birthplace of Elvis

Population: None of Your Goddamn Business.

See‚ Boy‚ now you’re in a trouble love‚ one that shatters

teeth and gimps your knees with a crescent wrench‚

so as you arrive unannounced at her parents’ house‚

The other man coming across the lawn‚ tire iron

in hand‚ his lip cleft with the same delinquent twitch

The King wore in Jailhouse Rock‚ only meaner‚

but before he can lay a finger on you‚ it’s time for

the Big Speech. With the assembled family watching,

you recount a love unequalled since Beatrice and Dante,

a Siamese intimacy of body and mind that defies

physics‚ noblesse oblige‚ and the cosmos itself.

A covey of doves flits in everyone’s chest.

The other man‚ now wistful and tender‚ says‚

You winned her fair and square‚ which doesn’t

make sense‚ but who cares? After you kiss Beth

in the primrose last scene‚ credits run‚ aisle lights

shunt the audience from the labial walls of the theatre

and into the parking lot‚ where things really heat up.