Uncle Joe Stalin visited Vermont, July of ’34—
same month and year Federico Garcia Lorca was in Eden Mills; Lorca took two days
to sober up from a long rollicking train ride to Montpelier where Stalin
disembarked three days before:
imagine poet and tyrant passed each other in paddle boats
under Belvidere Mountain: each saw
the other’s profile on the decks of lake cottages:
Stalin recovering from
delicate surgery to remove a slug
from his spine: Lorca adrift
in early summer moonshine; a trussed up Stalin
plotted terror under the stars. Lorca
sat in an ocean liner chair swatting
black flies. Then night came on, little wreaths
of death, mosquitoes with their
transparent yellow wings.
