Mayakovsky in New York: A Found Poem
Illustrations by Miki LoweWhen the Soviet poet Vladimir Mayakovsky visited America in 1925, he had to admit that there was something grand about the country. He was amazed by electricity and railroad stations. He stepped onto the Brooklyn Bridge, he wrote, “as a crazed believer enters a church”; of the skyscrapers, he marveled, “Some buildings are as high as the stars.” But he was aware of darker currents.