The Green Helmet
- The Green Helmet
A runner jogs past the bottle bushacross the way, red blossomstoned down by all this fog today,sneakers slapping on the concretelike stropped leather. Bare-chestedin chilly weather he wearsbackwards on his curly Irish heada fireman’s helmet that evenin the grayness of this sceneis clearly green. Surely no greennot itself upon a mint or parrothas any need or right to bethat green. Especially ona fireman’s helmet flauntedas the logo of a loutish joggerfeet reversed and running backward. [End Page 49]
Mark Smith’s poetry has appeared recently in Pleiades, Worcester Review, and Gettysburg Review. He is the recipient of fellowships and grants from the Guggenheim, Rockefeller, Fulbright, and Ingram Merrill Foundations and the NEA. A novelist, he lives in DeLand, Florida.
