poetry.1
collage by Charles
Henri FORD
|
milk
volume one
Joe AMATO/Jack
ANDERSON/Bill BERKSON/John BRANDI/Ira COHEN/ Wanda COLEMAN/byron
COLEY/ Cid CORMAN/Hamid Echbihi EL IDRISSI/Krista
FRANKLIN/Denis GALLAGHER/Allan GRAUBARD/ Michael
HAEFLINGER/Ken HAPONEK/Jack HIRSCHMAN/ Nuno JÚDICE/Frank LIMA/Matthew LIMA/Duane
LOCKE/Gerard MALANGA/Joseph MASSEY/
Marty MATZ/David MELTZER/ thurston MOORE/Sheila E.
MURPHY/ Mark OWENS/Simon PERCHIK/John PERREAULT/Janine
POMMY VEGA/ Michael ROTHENBERG/Larry SAWYER/Hazel
SMITH/Mike TOPP/Roberto VALENZA/Lina ramona VITKAUSKAS/ A.D.
WINANS/Mark YAKICH
|
sitting in the
café of
our heroes: just
walked along footprinted
sidewalks gazing
at the blue
between the clouds: edit
as you
run (the h
i
l
l
s
will stumble
you) up
into the next
neon glow: the regulars talk over
their heads
about the midwest and
world travel and agree suspiciously
too much
with one
another:
THE CHARGE OF POETRY
for Dave Murray
It's difficult to tell what a poem is
these days
because poetry is changing
and yet most people don't seem to have noticed
I'm glad I'm writing this poem
because it gives me the cozy illusion of taking a political stand.
Anthologies mainly stay the same
when you flick the pages you can't see too much to ruffle tradition
which is convenient because people can buy them and don't have to bother
reading them
or thinking
or reconsidering anything
and journals can continue not to review spoken word CDs because they aren't
'books'
and academics can still seem daring and trendy if they write about the American
language poets
there are a lot of unwritten rules
about how you should write
you shouldn't write poems which don't make comparisons
or make too many
metaphor shouldn't collude too much with metonymy
because a poem has to be centered and cohesive
and even if you don't talk about yourself
you should allude to your personal problems
because poetic voyeurism is still firmly in place
and what people love most is not dirty realism
but dirty linen
and if you write poems which need to be performed
or poems which only exist in the studio
or poems which could hang in a gallery
or poems which speak their own language
you shouldn't be so naive as to expect anyone to publish them
some say that metaphor
is bourgeois or patriarchal
perhaps it is but I've nothing against metaphor
or any other poetic regime
unless it becomes a straight jacket
something you have to do
like standing to attention
or licking the boots of your betters
I like metaphor which strips off and then cross dresses
metaphor which is slightly infirm
a house which might fall down if you slammed the door too hard
I like a poem which relocates by burning its visa
a poem which won't fit in and do what everyone else in the family does
which never combs its hair or gets shaved
which takes the chair away when someone is trying to sit down
which sings and shows off and makes an exhibition of itself like Madonna
a poem made out of trash and rudery and rubble
which campaigns in baggy clothes for radical change
till it's hoarse in the throat and forgets its own slogans
and everything it says means so little that
it persuades me to drop everything
quit the house without locking the doors or shutting the windows
leave the bills-even the gym membership-unpaid
and breathlessly, recklessly, shamelessly
run with its rhythm.
FOR GUILLAUME APOLLINAIRE
fins of an ancient world, a burger
beneath the Eiffel tower a troupe of matadors
assess the lives of antique grocers
Romaine lettuce peering out from automobiles
religion is resting still nude upon the grass
Europe of the soul, Christianity smells
of modern equations, Pope with your robes
reticent observer walking these streets
confessor of eggs and wallpaper
the prospect of these catalogs in the rain
25 cents for the adventures of a policeman
divers beneath the shadows, your portrait Guillaume
lends joy an obsolete moon, clarion of sun
director of beautiful dinosaurs, flesh trumpets
resound beneath the mural on the wall
JAMES INDUSTRY TONIGHT BULLFIGHT LONELINESS
streets of Paris resound in your mighty charms
violins of June, an encore of strange beautiful infants
white habits dancing in the glass
fame is an ancient friend among the pews, stained glass
pompadour of love and you there with your hours
blue casements of forgotten collage
amethyst profundity pronounces torch-lit red vents
gas creeping silently along the skin
eternity is honored among six branches
seven if you count resuscitation
Christ was merely an aviator to the birds
landing on a record playing venerable hymns
oceans of Africa, fountains of mercurial blood
forgive us of our sins this immaculate night of panthers
dripping instants, a siren awakes and calls your name
Paris dances, a foul maintenance man
roulette wheels spinning monasteries and short piers
dropping off into nothing but blackness
sad music of presidents regard the women beautiful
you are an orange or else the moon
a house, a table, the lips of a rose
you resemble a song, familiar as yourself
brilliant son of lost waters.
nordic las vegas
gleaning light never truly was her specialty.
taking it down like Christmas in June,
(customary to the most defiled executors)
all extrinsic factors taken into account,
was the most facile, compliant alternative
to a bitch who radiated seldom in a vast city of herself.
the sex, the gambles, the buffets
all eaten off her stomach like feticide
1,000-gravida girl with no womb
swelled with Lolita's tendencies
and armed with Lombard's wit
profession made prophecy
for an ideal lifetime of cold winters.
5 tankas for legendary bob
1.
floating on a cloud
of cheese & sweet thoughts of cheese
legendary bob
shifts gears for a good long while
before he touches the clutch
2.
printed on a couch
in an edition of one
the hind plates of bob
make a broadside mocking us
& all those w/whom we sail
3.
working on a list
against whose side walls splashing
ideas are kept from
becoming leaked puddles
on the floor of the dark room
4.
seated at a screen
idea-sputs flow in & out
too quickly to catch
their loose strings on either edge
of the educated door
5.
drinking from a cup
drawn from a well of root beer
legendary bob
assesses the placement of
all strata of liquid flux
The Nature of Violent Storms
Slowly the clouds came to be mentioned,
Moving in so that of the sky only searchlights remained.
Those are roads when we accept the way we are going,
Always steering towards safety,
Problems to become painless, possible to trap into belief;
But the new reality of sight had only recently surrendered.
The quiet airshaft becomes private in a gentle way to be useful.
Now it was to be confirmed;
There was no time to give
Into the comprehension of the road
Signs, the cross signals, everything submerged in the trees.
Ever since the graduation there has been this public
Notice to everything
Static. We shall never have known the wind
In the car of our mishap from whatever was sensed of the danger
To wish it would cause us to live.
The photos will only produce small notice of caution before impulse.
We go forth into the collision.
What had you been putting together
The coat freshly bloodied
I go on leaving you like clouds but
There's a remarkable assurance in the way of all this
You were not asked to leave, yet received the prize
All the way into the cheese
Cake, the yellow carnation.
I thought writing this
Of the "soft shoulder" you spoke freely
As difficult in the tunnel
You come through but
In the winter the drainpipe
To decide the soft edge of a headache.
There was no return to the approach but the signs were in sight.
We get happy, on
The hate
All the trees
Students visit
Winter brushes the shackle
The boy has lived in this house
Hold in the darkness all year.
Is the ambulance with the red tape?
"Mush" categorically "goes"
We are helpless in the turn on the road,
But the lights and the passion persist,
Knowing we cannot move to miss them.
Yet I own every suit I am wearing.
And the high degree of the promise
Through long distance is easy.
Though we are not almost always alone,
There are many cigarettes in the cigarette
Machine. Something goes into my veins
And excites me. We learn
Nothing as the result of being
Somewhere else, and I find
It's too often brief and precise
In terms that allow time for personal
Bank checks to clear.
Our sight would help us, but we
Go blind from insignificance.
Though I say the things I wish to keep secret
They are important.
Their own event conceives it.
So I am well
Groomed, those hills, those trees
Know not the flame of the cough,
Nor is there one cloud
Burst whose oval shape has known me for a
Fuss. Day continually she seemed to.
But he will always to the bird.
We were going away from all that,
Not waiting, the "exchangeable" remains
For you to insist on the right fashion.
The postcard arrives
Tasteless groceries entity
The end is in sight
For what we don't turn around into the glare
Experiencing the fenders pressed into blocks
The clouds over our heads
His face goes red
No blankets are here,
No limit to what's witnessed,
But the man's shovel poking, carelessly,
Efficiently under the car
The surprise you were keeping to give someone:
Only the red, blinking light on the road has any importance.
I think I am with them on that road
Detour, but it lacks "falling rocks"
Zones. The ambulance moved apart
And those who had been "standing"
Pulled away, as though yearning
To think sleeping in faraway places.
It's the one thing that can save us.
And so the vacation stays
Close to the future and living.
The sunrise is planted firmly on the horizon.
Headlines invade the privacy of our lives
On the road overlooking the valley
Where we gave up.
The attendants took us.
We were discovering how to get
Along together in another way of life.
You will never get married.
Perhaps we will never come this far,
But the experience of not solving the problem
Leading everywhere for hundreds of feet
The engine rupture-
The canvas bag, mangy and pale,
Going into the wagon.
The acetylene was not needed.
We are let out of the hoax of wind.
I understand to accept the cloud
Bursts, the general disbelief of all this
Safety. I cannot feel the dead
Weight, wishing only not to be here.
These were thoughts of getting out by roads of the city.
The screams are short, managing to end in the heat. By day
Break identification just another topic.
We were to have arrived an hour later
Than usual. There's a remarking of the road
Bed, the maintenance crew came
To clear away the debris;
That the critical boredom was hanging on
Like a limp body draped over the car
Door smashed open
On the sharp turn to discourage
The twilight of speed,
Severe for the power he forces down with his foot.
So the metal is divided into thousands of small pieces
And of those that are kept are marked and observed
Trying to piece together "alternatives," "motives,"
Examining the wet properties of metal,
She cannot bear children.
This new reality moves on the walls
And of other qualities life is the space
Age one could imagine results in the rainy day
Dream. Something to match the oval edges of clouds,
The signs replaced and all the tar gone.
No idea is eliminated.
We hadn't noticed ice replaced rain
As the sun went further away into the sea
Storm, yellow over the waves, red as hot sores.
The decision in your life
Insurance is not made known.
Here on the green hills he had mistaken the brick for overalls.
"Goodbye, for now" signed, the perfect warrior.
The trees growing up out of rocks,
This highway vaults secondary roads and bypasses metropolitan areas
As it sweeps across the Western countryside.
The day is warm and beside the burn in our throats
We don't want, the complications and threat
We now seem to conceal, the flat clouds rush away.
Tomorrow we will forget the temporary relief and the dignity
There was not time enough to assure.
AMERICAN SONNET (88)
looking back. no laugh yet
in this rage of ghostaxis & snuff erotica
can one art rescue another in decline?
(vis-a-vis hydrotherapy & long-term
flood survival: highjack it-one's
only guarantee the ship will dock)
mayday. am trapped in a bag of false positives
on covert travels with self-circling airport
on cruise control. mayday. up to navel
in yellow-bellied lip service. mayday. under
attack by pink pearl erasers
madam. the light at the end of this tunnel
is a streamliner coming head-on
bring me
to where
my blood moves
MUSINGS BEFORE RAINFALL
the spill of light across skin
expresses the gesture of a moment
and the possibility of endless like moments
the difference between color and pigment
should be savored-intervals across
the racial spectrum
white and the reconstructive powers
of warmth & coolness
the drive behind all art is the attainment
of sexual perfection. to fail perfection
is to inspire regeneration
(a thang of quality be a beauty fo'evah)
hate is the by-product of certain modes of
frustrated desires, therefore
the inevitable is a mirror psychosis
like loves only like
the motives of couples are profound
when they strive at their love as a result
of reconsideration
and
when they believe
in the supremacy of their couplings
their love creates a stir in this world
SEARS LIFE
it makes me nervous to go into a store
because i never know if i'm going to
come out. have you noticed how much
they look like prisons these days? no display
windows anymore. all that cold soulless
lighting-as atmospheric as county jail-
and all that ground-breaking status-quo
shattering rock 'n roll reduced to neuron
pablum and piped in over the escalators.
breaks my rebel heart. and i especially
hate the aroma of fresh-nuked popcorn
rushing my nose, throwing my stomach off
balance. eyes follow me everywhere i go like
i'm a neon sign that shouts shoplifter.
and so many snide counter rats want to
service me, it almost makes me feel rich
and royal. that's why i rarely bother to
browse. i go straight to the department of
the object of conjecture, make my decision
quick, throw down the cash and split
one time i had barely left this store
when i heard somebody yelling stop! stop!
i turned around and this dough-fleshed
armed security guard was waving me down.
i waited while he caught his breath and
demanded to search my purse. i stared him
into his socks. we're outside the store,
i reminded him. if you search me, you'd
better find some goddamned something. he
took a minute to examine my eyes, turned
around and went back to his job, snorting
dust and coondogging teenage loiterers
It's raining
the rain falls thus
a glimpse of sunshine
more sunshine
more rain, i'm afraid
the weather, the weather
what can be done?
a movie, Summer Holiday
dystopia on the street
useless, useless, useless
logic of the seasons
pussy won't go outside
summer's a freak
blame the churches
damp hair, wind
rain, rain, rain
and more rain
i can't even see
further than that
indoors, the familiar
pussy and me
this
18
What's left is the stillness
as every mirror will store
a cramp hugging that corner
where the glaze aches
and my lips still dive for lips
for the soft grasses, all
lost! my stare
smelling from pebbles, mud
heartbeats knee deep
and this soap dripping a reflection
hung like a pelt -even you
would have eaten its flesh, your lips
as if the sun was still cold
when your kiss moved closer.
What's left is this mirror
steaming, the Earth emptying its core
and its water, fiery as ever
cracks the frozen glass
the deadlocked stillness.
40
Again a brush sealing this boat
as wings covered with sun
sweeter than milk and lush sugar oil
and still this wood losing weight, camped
around some secret fire growing fat inside
till the sky itself is drained, the paint
lifted :blisters torn open
trying to keep back the air
--a furious headwind, a fever
rotting these planks--a fire
forgotten in this hull
almost a bell whose flames
are nourished the way a rope
is pulled from some soft pond
and the sun each morning
crawls out to cool--this boat
is melting! the fire inside its planks
still frightened by water, by a brush
that covers the world, painting again
and dries like putting a seabird to death.
28
All night the sun wider and wider.
Until I heard my name
nothing lives, like in that lake
where before the sword rises
you hear its name
--from your warm neck its kiss
growing larger.
I hardly recognize the light
or my name breathing
already begins to count
--until I hear my name
your voice had no arms
no eyes--I feed on a voice
that follows from the womb
calling as each mother calls
a word different
surrounded by all others
--these walls and your shadow
roll in my mouth
without the swallowing
--only a whisper
and Earth pulling itself out
heard its name.
clouds/prayers for milk jane
clouds/prayers for milk jane - she hitched from wonderland to new freedom--
memory serves me fondly w/jane milk jane stealing wallets from rides
dashboards. kicking coke machines busting phones - jane made LOVE cuz fucking
was for dups - she was into hippie cumming to an END -- milk jane knew about
punk before the magazine was called PUNK - where the fuck is milk jane milk
jane - pot pot and chicken fried steaks and milkshakes - jane hitched
everywhere - thats how i lost track - so i moved to newyork -- she liked
anything - i liked onething: newyork - fuck l.a. - germs are OVER -
milkjane probably could’ve loved the germs - probably desperately could’ve had
germs burn and beat don bolles head to the wall stick nipple in his face,
laff and leave him --stranded--. she’d do that to hippies - punkx would’ve been
more fun - but she split - we split right before punk - she made a salad and
ate it - she was into making salads and then hitching to this shit bar in
brewster and we’d just fucking sit there and watch older fucks burn OUT -- i
heard about the ramones but it was too late - milk jane kinda booked - was
gone - maybe she would’ve held me back from the snob art soho circle of sput.
--but that would’ve sukked - i needed to witness such now-white-SMASH --
milk jane is married dead happy burnt --write me mj read this in a bookstore
one chance in a fuckingmillion - read this and write me . write me write me
write me write me write me write me before its too late - before i lose
everything i can hardly smell anymore - you were everything i can remember.
and memory is nothing but the smell of your legs 1/2 drunk, no future, thai
stick in the graveyard -
CRUTCHES
Hanging off my crutches looking
at nothing in particular
I find it
best
Ramana Maharshi says, Who is sleeping?
Who?
The one who looks over gardens
catching that light as it cuts the fence
nothing inside nothing outside
Who is that?
Eastern C.F., August 27, '98.
RIGHT HERE
Ripples on the underbelly of a concrete bridge
sun on the moving stream
a heron takes flight
blue pterodactyl
from the center of town.
Across the stream is an open field
tenacious spider crosses
my hand
a man crossing the street with his dog says
this is a lovely place to sit.
He's right
I'm grateful you're alive
on the planet, that I got to know you
that we're both here at the same time.
Amazing.
Rhinebeck, N.Y., September 29, 98.
ON SATURDAY NIGHT
he must have left
his sweet tooth
along with the
upstart cactus
we carried home
in a blue tea cup
teetering on the upside
down lid of a shoebox
in the witching hour,
i eat chocolate chip cookies
or light up
and watch the cat
blink and scatter
from the smoke
that creeps his way.
in-between
the dish washing
and coffee making,
the channel flipping
and space staring,
i think of fixing
a late night snack
something sweet and
creamy to overpower
the taste
of stale cigarettes
and old coffee
something sweet
like a picture book
before bedtime
to smooth the folds
before i drift.
Broken
Bring me your savage
education, tenderness that flows
like my blood, erasing me; each morning,
dusted with stars, the memory
of ash, on spreading wings.
I will accept
chains, embracing the
bottom of the world.
What a gift, to be turned inside out.
A carnival of orbits and fire,
days will sharpen
into a brilliant comet
that spears skyward.
Joy is a huge delicate bird that comes at dusk.
AFTER SILENCE
After science,
we have
perfumes of
various sorts.
And then the
month,
I don't know
why,
Nor do I know
the colors,
without
warning,
without
warts,
of the
expanding.
It is as if I
am invisible;
it is as if I
am dead.
The air passes
through me,
moving through
my head,
as
I stroll down
halls.
Look at my
hands:
they are
animal hands
and yet they
are glass.
And my bare
feet
are attached
to my legs.
My brain is in
codes.
You are triple,
You
are glass.
What
you buy
is
who you are.
And
yet
the
allegory
continues.
Even
without credit.
Even
without cash.
There
is no air.
There
is no death.
There
is no sex.
There
is no class.
As to that,
find what
could be only
not
what was dream
in this wide
world
outside the
scheme
and then some
handsome
partners in
crime
will pass the
time
from hand to
hand.
A tall and
handy
and then some
favoring weeks
might be my
by and by
between the
cheeks.
Blessed are the
damned
by cruel
society.
Society is
species.
You, you could
count the
years
and count the
hills.
You could count
the armpits.
Blessed are the
mothers
who eat their
children
and the fathers
who, in a time
of reward,
will have no
sons.
It was better
if not cleaner
on the beach-
early morning,
when you were
the only dog.
the only car.
And you,
you
thought you
were glass.
Blessed are the
children
who have no
language:
language is
government.
Either I am big
or I am huge.
I have no love
or glory;
I have no fear
-until all
three
descend on me
and once again
I reappear.
Para Maria
the lover and the abyss she naps on
moonlight pushes
from behind her eyelids
putting my hand in her lightest ash
a porous spark
after two whispers strike
crickets bend the dark w/heavy legs
NOCTURNE, MEKONG RIVER
Time borrows from me
I love you through sheets of mahogany
and green, a map of skin wrinkled
then easy again, a prow breaking waves
over jagged rock shored by war-pocked hills
whose zigzag trails rise and fall
through rags of moonlit clouds, where
your fingers pose carefully
above each eye to shade the glare
of history's conspiracy
O body darklit
and brief among mist-washed peaks
yours is a tough grace
that defies the brush, O burning river
mended with stanzas of fine rain
I am free of wings in the soft breath
of your harbor, I am coming up
with flowers from the sandy
fiction of remembrance
no machine in the way, no doubt
playing games with night's
sweet determination.
Pak Beng, Lao
O ILLUSION
YOU SPREAD DELICIOUSLY
Low cut
Impersonator of the Dream
I eat you in my sleep
Suck babylon between my teeth
Make wave and froth
In yr crease
I do not fear
As you lift, all hair and flaming smile
To cover my root and swallow
The tree whose branches
Hold the sun
Each time you
Take me in, I find a new word
For light
You are lavish
And wild, you make strong
the body, leave the ego tiny
After you come.
Pashupatinath, Nepal
HISTORY AT NIGHT
for Kevin Killian
It happened in Roddy McDowall's New York apartment, the night he gave a party
for Judy Garland and a few good friends. It was also the night of the Democratic
Convention in Los Angeles. Central Park West, July 11, 1960, respectively. Myrna
Loy fresh from her return to movie stardom in From the Terrace. Montgomery
Clift recuperating apace. Adlai Stevenson was supposed to be a shoe-in as the
Democrats' nominee for President of the United States. Lauren "Betty" Bacall, an
avid Adlai fan, had gone off alone to Roddy's bedroom to watch the proceedings
on TV. "Those sons of bitches," growled Betty, appearing nonplussed in the
doorway to the living room. Judy was laughing and confiding, patting Monty's
knees. Stephen Sondheim listened and lifted and lowered his chin. Carol Lawrence
watched, starry-eyed, somewhat awestruck, and Larry Kert wondered. No one
knew much about John F. Kennedy yet. All they could think was "Harvard" and
"Boston Irish Catholic." Judy drank Blue Nun wine poured from the tall, thin
bottle she had brought in a black tote bag.
Alligator of Happiness
I ride the subway with all these bare-breasted faces.
To my eternal discredit,
They remind me of my five minute life,
And its pounding against my heart.
My fantasy is I am a loitering hunter
Of nudes who ride the subways,
With eyes that crack the light of men who stare.
The nudes are beautiful white ants in the darkness,
Blowing coins and leaves at me.
My technique is familiar and simple conversation,
Rhyming the forbidden words.
They accumulate like cities in Iceland.
The words are flames and I am their lycanthropy.
The ride on the subway pretends I do not exist.
But I eventuate like the law of someone's
Humanity I will never cheat.
These are hungry old habits,
The voyeurs of childhood,
We allow to run our lives as adults.
Still, I wait for them,
Like the alligator of happiness,
With a bouquet of senile flowers.
They finally appear like birds from the Nile.
I have kept this appointment all my life.
Adoration
Tota pulchra es, amica mea.
It rains inside of me.
Your picture is my wall.
My coffee is your blood.
The pillow is a morning glory,
With its impression of your head.
O my breathless soul,
The quiet servant
Clearing away the words
Of stolen cars.
I TAKE NO SLAVES
I take no slaves
and my bondage is a breath
I am nothing's thing
I am less than, and more
I am with zero
ten
And in such happiness
I resist everything except
your plunder of me,
your reaching in and scavenging
my laughter of rags
my chaos of litter
I am dumpster
I am trashcantation
shaking writhing
I am the glue of a dead god
hat is smeared all over
your body
where the posters
for tomorrow's demonstration
are slapped
and the graffiti
are scrawled
in blood and sperm.
ONE DAY
I'm gonna give up writing and just paint
I'm gonna give up painting and just sing
I'm gonna give up singing and just sit
I'm gonna give up sitting and just breathe
I'm gonna give up breathing and just die
I'm gonna give up dying and just love
I'm gonna give up loving and just write.
Poem to a section of
wallpaper in a Chinese restaurant
Woman with a black fan and firm red gown, weightless over a wall
face spent of fear, now the patrons
now the gray air conditioner
neither can read her loose panel of calligraphy
Settled in a pretense of respect
black fan poised,
it has yellowed through the seasons
and has sharpened
"Tell the truth
then run"
she seems to whisper over the shoulder of a glass-eared man
what fortune
DAY 12
When he looks at me, my flesh, my bones,
evaporate. I am a prisoner in his eyes, and
without them-the light that gleams, that
scatters-I am nothing; for him I am
nothing. But when he closes them, when he
drifts in the darkness beneath his lids, I
sense my freedom. Words return to me, the
elusive past, other lands, moments!
I breathe with the shuttered pain of a
girl becoming a woman. I stretch out my
hands to the singular body I yearn to touch. I
dive through the clouds that have blossomed
from my feet. I open my mouth and drink the
torrent of my excessive thirst.
These are my breasts, shoulders, arms,
and this, the hollow at the base of my throat,
where tiny shadows torment and gambol.
Below, where my waist slopes to the black
tangle of my sex, and my thighs are born,
machines of velocity, I become pure
temptation.
I surge and recede. I ride the boast of a
simple step. And when I pivot suddenly,
sniffing my prey, the thrill of capture,
asphyxiation, rending distills for me alone.
It is time, my time, the only time I will
ever have. For it comes again and it dies and
returns and vanishes.
And in each I take something of the
last, a brief sensual stain, eruptive blood,
thrashing dust: monuments to the triumph
that sustains me.
For when he looks at me again, tilting
me this way and that, the venom quickly
spreads. Whatever I had gained, I give up.
Even the compassion of being a woman for a
man, and of accepting nothing less, pivots to
the storms that brew in his eyes.
But that, like much else, is what I have
known.
I offer no excuse; I want no
compensation.
And you, who wants more, forget me.
Brussels
Here in the shadow
of the Church of Saint Marie
where the comfort of greatness
costs no more than the price
of a little heart
I wake to the unspoken
in the middle of the night
& take my warning from the
blood's rumor
A stranger in the field
of sleep crosses the border
of our separation
and I see the fallen light
leap up in the darkness
The war is over
but the casualties continue
as the first snow of winter
disappears-
a confectioner's dream
dissolved by dread.
Dec. 5, 1998
For Liza Stelle
Hither Hills, Montauk
Awake in a dark room
in the middle of the night
Too many sleeping bodies
for an insomniac with a fractured
elbow
Today we remember Liza,
bury her ashes under a shade
tree
behind the house
Kasoundra tells me of a game
Liza played with Lakshmi
who was around four years old
at the time
They traded sentences,
Maybe it was supposed to be
insults, & Lakshmi said,
"You are sex & cement!"
I am an aerial in the darkness
awaiting a flash of lightning
The procession still goes on
after reaching the sea where the urn
is washed clean-
The eyrie will be made with notched
wood
Not a single nail will be necessary
Venus is a mirror surrounded
by clouds,
eternity is surrounded by bolts of
lightning
& you appear in negative
freckled with bits of mica
singing a song filled with desire
"Take the scenic route," you said-
Brightly colored Tibetan flags
surround your tent-
Invisibility surrounds your presence
to us, who have not yet embarked
So long, Rainbow, evanescence
was your middle name!
The Day That Paul Bowles Died*
"Having no hope we live in longing"
Eternal you remain
After three days in a coma...
you were my link to the last
millennium,
the 1940's camel hair overcoat
I could borrow from the closet.
when I asked you if you knew
Rumi,
you replied by asking,
"where is that?"
yet you knew Paul Robeson
& Greta Garbo--
a world of music in your head
I can't imagine Tangier without
you,
just another old swimming pool
with grass growing in it
the muezzin sings your name
over the Casbah,
amigo, Sahabi--
Haunted by puberty,
almost blind & hard of hearing,
a rush of gardenias sends you
on your way--
So long, pal, a last pipe of kif &
salaam
now you are public property
Headlines break the paint on mules ride slalom
Maybe how you spell that word's abrupt
Let's go for a walk let's go for a drive you never hear
A person say that anymore it's catch up get ahead
Approximate catalysis of he-man structured
To bequeath a forest loose-grained terra cotta hued
Imaginal refractive dimly lit attention span
All cows eat grass lonely little wooden room you'd think
We had been rich should have it's never midnight
When I'm scanning the environment
Over the month of August I serenely plan to get intelligent
Pare down the striptease benefit the featured mantra
Zoom lens feta cheese and balderdash
Imagine taking every bit of time to enter data
This politely squeezed between the college ruled
Lines of a notebook codex thought to thread
These newly glistened lines through headrests
Your extorted father paid for
if poets & poetry schools
had a competition not unlike the NBA playoffs
for their season-long efforts the Objectivists earn a 1st round bye
The New York School gets homefield advantage in Madison Square Garden
led by beefy Ashbery in the paint, who averages 19.6 sestinas
& 8.2 pantoums a game
crafty O'Hara at the point guard spot
and the always dangerous Kenneth Koch, shooting the lights out
when his team needs him most!
They face a tough 1st round series against the Beats
coached by retired Imagist Williams
and brings a helter-skelter triple scoring offensive attack of Ginsberg, Kerouac,
& veteran journeyman William "Billy" Burroughs.
The question is as in previous playoff series with the Beats:
will their on-the-court problems affect their post-season dreams?
Who can forget last year's championship game with the Black Mountain Miners
when a drunken Kerouac punched out swing man Rob Creeley over
a thundering tomahawk dunk?
Or Burroughs wrapping his sweat towel taut around his bicep
during a 20 second timeout? Or Ginsberg ejected
for refusing to stop chanting during Charlie Olson's free throws?
This just in: Black Revolutionaries defeat Transcendental Turtles in a 3 pointer
off the glass buzzer beater by Baraka!
(true fans will remember Baraka as LeRoi Jones from his ABA days)
*previously unpublished in milk
to poetry.2
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