(second largest theatre in the U.S.)
Whenever, in that ceiling sky,
Familiar clouds once more go by,
And in the restrooms, far below,
One half the lamps of Islam glow;
When, overweight but overawed,
Undying Grace, eternal Maude,
Once more are en rapport—are one
With Myrna Loy and Irene Dunne
(Irene as essence, Maude; Ur-Myrna:
Now the new star Annapurna,
Nepalese and thick of tongue);
Or when, pure movie, pure, brave, young,
The Foreign Legion dare and do,
Each year is 1932;
Pre-Eleanor, pre-war, pre-Fala;
Time as place: the Garden of Allah,
Near whose entrance, chill with Freon,
That time’s great sign resists still Neon,
To be through Moorish, Hoover nights
This fugue of incandescent lights;
As if to make some statement yet;
As if the tan brick minaret
Were point and counterpoint; not theme,
But theme to be, that when the dream
Maude dreams is ours, and we too nod,
States then “There is no God but God …”
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