Читать книгу At the Great Door of Morning - Robert Hedin - Страница 14

The Greatest

for Michael Waters

What I remember most about Muhammad Ali

Are not the fast hands and loose, graceful footwork.

Or Manila or Zaire. Or even what came after—

The slurred speech, the sad slow shuffle.

No, what I remember is a boy somewhere

In the foothills of the snowy Zagros Mountains,

A small Kurdish boy in a long blue robe

Who gave us directions that day we were lost,

And how he knew nothing of America

But two syllables he sang over and over

In the high-pitched voice of a girl—

Ali, Ali—then laughed and all at once

Began to bob and weave, jabbing and juking,

His robe flaring a moment like a fighter’s.

Ali. One word, two bright syllables

That turned to smoke in the morning air.

And he pointed down the long, dusty road

To Hatra and Ur, the ruins of Babylon,

And the two ancient rivers we had read about,

Their dark starless waters draining away into fog.