tucked inside the rock, beneath a huge
forever-ticking metronome, the urge
to strut around the place and set the party
on fire with moves that startle, and to purge
oneself of failure, ripples round a sweaty
bar whose name – ‘Stalin’ – and its weighty
overtones of overlords oblige
me to wonder, “Why’s there not a bar in Paris
called ‘Hitler’ underneath a metronome?
Would such a badge of servitude embarrass
Frenchmen till they disavow their home?”
Meanwhile, down the road, the Petrin Tower apes his older
brother, Eiffel, dwarfing him by standing on a shoulder.
