3217. I COPIED THE MONA LISA

I COPIED THE MONA LISA

I copied the Mona Lisa.
I have things that disappeared.
I took the favored capsule with a
wink; its nod and smile too. I marked
the distant background - all the hillocks
and greens, as if a meandering river
ran through, a brigand's hat and a
carriage too, a castle, a moat, a coach.
No monk to seek disfavor, I stalked
across this land at will : a distant, rural
cousin to today's new urban kin.

3216. DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN

DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN

I brought the man down from the mountain
in a box; he was holding a dead-man's letter
in his clasped hands, addressed to no one
in particular. I never did take it from him.
We just buried him instead. Lilacs grew from
that point, some years later. Lilacs with letters
instead of blooms. Bees and birds seemed
always buzzing around.

3215. KNOEBELESCENT

KNOEBELESCENT

Wasn't what I'd say I'd said before :
jiminy-cricket and all the Balfour
Declaration stuff. The funny Jew guy,
in the leather boots, jumped off the
stage as soon as it stopped in town and -
wouldn't you figure - ups and breaks
his ankle. Had the whole town laughing.
-
No sooner had the Doubloon-King entered the
darkened arena (it was fight-night) everyone
already knew he was destined to lose. Five feet,
ten inches up against a big six-plus footer. Taller
and bigger, let alone the reach. 'He can call his'self
whatever he wants,' the crowd mumbled, 'but he
ain't no King of nothing!' Over in three rounds.
-
'Well, I guess you're supposed to like the blood,
not sputter over it!' The guy saying that was
Henk Wilcox, a local, and he was speaking to his
cousin Inky, who was just then commenting on
the massacre. 'Like going to a lynching and
crying 'cause the guy soiled his pants.'
-
Damn, damn, I love these old small towns.

3215. ALL THOSE EMPTY PIECES

ALL THOSE EMPTY PIECES

I jumped from the spire and sand all
the way down to my (very religious)
death. A truly personal moment, that.
I met my maker going down, as I'd
met him going up. In a pure and
uninhibited silence. Like going to
a bank when drunk, satiated with
all that's wrong, wanting to stay
quiet so maybe no one notices
the wiry drunk taking out a
wad of money. He may have
looked over, as well, but
never said a word.

3214. MIGHT BE THE WILD ONE

MIGHT BE THE WILD ONE
Could be, what the Hell, goes where it wants,
runs the train-tracks' gamut from Easthaven
to Blunting Point and returns back again by
rounding Center Grove. And - all the while -
it's me the flagman notices. Hiding out in the
tobacco car with Jim Weston's pretty daughter,
pulling her down to my level while pulling her
panties down too. Just goes like that always
and ever. Rock rock and clap clop, the train
wheels trundle along, and we keep our rhythm
to that meter. We're really a team now, we are.

3213. MAGNIFICENCE

MAGNIFICENCE

Ever since the water fled, the iceman cometh
and the dark of a November sky was found
clutching my name, I thought enough and more
about you. Feathers fell from some hawkish
height, floating distantly only to land away.
In red pajamas or blue bandannas it never
seemed to matter - the same harmonica
guy always had you in his pocket. I wondered
about a hundred things at once, but mostly -
just today - watching those house-dress ladies
enter a 6:45 mass from across the street, I
wondered why. Incredible. They do this every
morning : parking their fabled cars like Midas
at the ends of the lot, they walk their gossipy
way across the pavement to huddle as they
enter the church. For what, my God, for what;
and is that even a question? What strep-throat
faith could this allegiance be? These women have
nothing other? I find it all so sad. Death and
resurrection, were it to mean anything at all
to them, would still have to have rules and
regulations attached. All the strictest
nomenclature to keep them in
their places, their archly
paradisaical places.

3212. AMIDST OTHER UNKNOWN CONDITIONS

AMIDST OTHER
UNKNOWN CONDITIONS
I was born into an adventure I was never quite
sure of; one where nothing ever quite measured up.
And then, of course, like so much else - the early-
morning milkman, the bread-truck which delivered,
the froth of cream at the top of fresh-farm milk, it
was simply all gone. Those two large dots in the sky,
curiously - and with aplomb - both greatly
different in their distance from me, yet still
about the same size to see. Ah! now that's
Relativity! I weathered most storms, I was
able to ride most seas. My problem,
before too long, and mainly, had
become communication : if I knew
what I wanted to say, no one was
listening, and if someone was
listening, I then knew not
what to say.

3211. THE MARKHAM BROTHER

THE MARKHAM BROTHER

He is a distant lad - far off, a continent away -
and always willing, it would seem to take his
part in action. He holds the hammer by its head,
and pounds. He looks askance at whatever
resembles a fantasy line, a story without
compunction, an ending where no logic
intrudes. 'I abhor things I can see right
through,' he says. So, as that may be, I
simply let it go; too tired to fight, and made
jagged by the rough-and-tumble, I meekly
roll away and let matters go wherever
they may go - for (if I may say),
it's really all the same to me.

3210. YES (YES)

YES (YES)
I am running this boat over the edge of the water;
a hard edge of glass, a clear sheet I can see through,
watching things go by. It is all a blur, like flying from
Parto to Balaroo, those distant stars I placed atop the
firmament I left long ago. And now, everywhere I
look, a hard, bright sunlight reflects off every
surface - the blast of illumination, the fiery glow
of presence, a reflected glory of all which is. I slow;
over there, atop that bulkhead and patio deck,
someone has suspended an effigy of a man - could
be a sailor or cowboy as well, I cannot readily
identify. A hanging human it is not; instead just
something to remind one of what it could be.
An outstretched hand, hanging there, in the
wind. At the same time, this boat slow-glides
over the shining water. Part of me wishes to
sing. Part of me wants to scream. I am caught
between two worlds, like a slime creature just
learning, ashore, to walk on two legs.

3209. EXILE AT FULMER'S POINT

EXILE AT FULMER'S POINT

All was in the taking down; my jasmine wand,
your harlequin. Standing at the top of a hill,
watching the sun fall slowly, dropping without a
sign from an insensate sky to some more morose
exile at the other side of this world. How long
and often we have waited for these moments?
-
Alongside us, in a white Park Ranger truck,
the slavishly attentive Ranger sat in his seat.
I watched - the window was open but an inch
or two, the air-conditioner poundingly blew
with the engine yet running, and there he sat,
diddling like a fool, jamming away of his onboard
computer keyboard : the names of all the stars,
the declensions of the planets, or just, as of us,
the names and identities of fools? Actually, he
really knew nothing at all, and I knew it.
-
Soon a vivid and rainbow colored sky set the
lower light of evening straight before us.
Reds, deep yellows, and even a halting green.
I could not deem, for anything, a reason for all of
this - and at that moment realized, no different
than the ranger, that I too was a fool in a dark,
unknown palace of intrigue. You and I, we smiled,
and somehow managed to walk away together.

3208. ON A BETTER FULFILLMENT

ON A BETTER FULFILLMENT
They brought the bread and the cake,
together - water and wine and loaves
and fishes. The clinging crowd was
grasping at spiritual straws, singing
low laments at the foot of Jesus Hill.
Cedars and cypresses, both, fell at
their Gilgamesh feet. A miracle was
about to happen, and they knew it.
-
Just as a maiden reclines for her
first, so the sky fell down now and
covered the people. An old, primordial
mass return, a gauze of consciousness
little known and long forgotten, now
hovered. With one great voice, the
fervid people cried out : 'My coins
and heart together, oh Divine,
shall join with you.'
-
Night came, and the satisfied people
went about their ways, the tongues
of fire still licking their brows.

3207. WITH YOU, MALAKA

WITH YOU, MALAKA
With you, Malaka, I am walking the lines
of this underground passage; only awakening
and only emerging as a new light overhead
beckons. We sit in cool chambers to think.
-
Glances at moments too soon let us
notice that that which calls us is nothing
more than uncertainty or possibility -
things to come, not necessarily coming.
I am fueled by the thought of what
comes between us; something like
a man, holding a lantern, in the dark.
-
I peer out, now and then, and return
only disappointed. What do I see?
The bloody calculus of but internment
and war, the twisted lines of conflict,
men with forked tongues, breaking
things before they are even made.

3206. BEETHOVEN IN YOUR FOOL'S CAP

BEETHOVEN IN
YOUR FOOL'S CAP
( an abstract : in the aerie)
There are so many layers of
what's to come, and to date
I can't find a thing. All the signs
and directions said it was Beethoven
in your fool's cap. I saw (by my own
mis-direction, that) there was no
end in sight. The kernel was the
corn of the matter, and, then, not.
-
I was reading your summation and
all I could say was - 'the bathroom was
the edge of the shelf, no?' That's how it
seemed anyway - and, and - I did
not have a Christian artifact; no blood
on a towel, no thorn from a crown, and
that was not wood of the cross in your
third-floor aerie. I was there. I saw.
-
A knock on the door from the KGB.
High-powered professionals and their
ideology. Putrefied remnants and bastards
at heart, it all becomes apparent : when
everyone writes, no one listens; when
everyone writes, no one reads. And what
is this life, then, for you, I wonder? 'A
constant struggle between good and evil?'
No, no, that's far too pat by far.
-
I have learned that the Balkan people
are descended from the Bacchae : (now
get this) : still sinking their teeth into
humanoid animals, into roast ox on the
spit, into an ox's stomach filled with a
finely-chopped offal, into a roasted sheep's
head out of which they lasciviously suck
the large, sad eyes like efficient, little
vacuum cleaners.
-
And these are only things I've newly
learned. There is no sepulchre like
Death, yet there is no Death like
what-has-been. We surmise so
much from so little. (That really
was Beethoven in your fool's cap).

3205. BRODSKY

BRODSKY
I awoke with Lord Weary's Castle,
my foreboding sense of doom, and
a few ideas. As that man Lowell,
dead in a taxicab but a few steps
from the street, so too I dwell
near something, but as yet
incomplete. It was Brodsky
whom I remember stating
one veiled version of this
truth best : 'I sit at my
desk; my life is
grotesque.'

3204. ENFILADE TO FUSSILADE

ENFILADE TO FUSSILADE
I ranged abruptly through a
military book, brooking the
range while climbing the hill
which needed taking. The
rat-tat-tat of an old-style
gun-strat ran ringingly
through the air. Dodging,
I held back, clutching
behind an oak tree -
hiding timorously
where I could not
see, and no one
could see me.

3203. ME AND YOU AND 33 THINGS BEFORE BREAKFAST

ME AND YOU AND 33 THINGS
BEFORE BREAKFAST

Ripping like a slugfest with Carter Hawley down the
highway and headed to Hawkeye Mountain. You
watching out for storms and weather, with your
big dark sunglasses and funny straw hat. 'You
remind me of country glamor,' I said, meaning
only anything good. 'Well I better,' you said,
'unless you mean some brand of country butter.'
-
Everywhere around us were mountains, hills
and meadows. The lush green of the treetops
was scraping the sky. 'I must have missed the
turn for Eden,' you said, 'or at least I didn't
see the sign.' I slid my hand down onto the
seat, sat back, and stretched straight out
my legs. 'I'm not moving 'til I have to,'
I said, 'and even then I'm not.'
-
Your face right then almost had a
smile too, staring right ahead.
'You're just full of it, full of
good ideas,' you said.

3202. ONLY WITH THE WATCHING

ONLY WITH THE WATCHING
And only as I knew the walkings and the places,
it was only then that the shadows welcomed
me in : the fences and the barricades, the
razor wires and the gates. All the foolish
people, those staying outside, they gazed

in wistfuly, watching my every move.
-
I carried their torch past the booming
cliffs. The light reflected off the glistening
rocks, water-seeped, and wet with spray.
Nothing I could do would match
the moment, nothing I could say
would best the motion. Striving
for perfection, I flounced the
moon, I spar'd the sun. I leapt.
In a frenzy, it was all over.

3201. ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION

ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION

We hold these truths and nothing else.
When in the course of human events.
All that came before that was that which
did come after. Philadelphia and its
Independence Hall. I saw you standing
in the limelight. Broken like a two-cent
fish fresh off the Penn's Landing dock.
-
I'm so tired of waiting for that cracked
bell to ring. I'm made sick by the tourists
and all that they bring : those festering
retards from Indiana, all those fucked-up
Boy Scouts rolling off buses from Ohio.
-
One thing is for certain, out here in the
distant front : Ben Franklin's ghost house,
a real crock of shit. Over there, where
Betsy Ross whored, there's nothing to it.

3200. LITANY GANAROSIS

LITANY GANAROSIS
Twenty-five years ago and more
what was done was done. I once
did drop the girl off at the hotel,
but I always left without seeing
the remains. All those hokey
hunters and farmers in Troy, PA.
-
And it wasn't just that, merely less -
ocean girl, who'd never seen the sea,
sky-diving lady, who'd never been off the
ground. How little it all mattered - none at
all. Somewhere in that small downtown was
the Ben Franklin Store. Named for a fellow who
wouldn't spend a nickel, but was always wanting
yours. I knew them all, the paupers and the
poor - and I walked with a head held high.
-
I sold tools to the mechanics, I sold water
to the swans. I drove school kids to their
deaths, I held councils with the deaf.
Small town oasis blues. I sang them
with the best, in 1972.

3199. MEDITATION 123

MEDITATION 123
I drew life from a different
fountain - one as such before
the lightened doors were closed.
And, now, in a beautiful sunrise
like this, I am sensing the new.
Cool breeze and yellow dawn;
where the birds shriek happy
singing and I am sitting alone.
One twist of a single moment,
and it's a strong and
different day.

3198. RAY GUN AND NEW GENES

RAY GUN AND NEW GENES
Came down from the mountain - yeah -
already forgetful of things : had my
John Ashbery typeface so beautifully
mounted and the big heap of sap-love
juicing out. These elm trees too spread
wide their wobbly haunches. Never
before had that gaslight gone out.
In my mind, it was 1954 - and I was
once more just learning to read. Oh
Bayonne stirrups, oh Kill Van Kull,
oh Magister Ludi and Erik Von Schull.
I take my tommy-knockers loaded
and she's got a sister too. This time
it's my horizon to where we're headed.
You can make it through.

3197. CASTARE'S GATE

CASTARE'S GATE
Is that how it's done, Charles;
how is it done? Why? Remember,
as I told you once, I am watching
over the kippered bridge connecting
me to Lambeth and you to London.
It was Mr. Blake himself, as I
told you, who ranted on the grass
about the summer soldier and
the military stuff. It got him, alas,
nowhere. All the prophetic books
in the world, as I see it, won't carry
you far past Castare's Gate.

3196. HE HAD

HE HAD
Very thin blood, and he walked
like a lynx. The rabbits came out
of his ears. The wind went around
him and the rain never touched.
Sunlight blinked when it came by
his presence. It sometimes goes
like that in an everyday Paradise.

3195. THIS VILLAGE IS BURNING

THIS VILLAGE IS BURNING

'I am the Samuel Pepys of guilt, yet I care nothing
at all for your wastrel ways.' After saying that,
he turned his head and said 'Good God, boys, look
what we've done now!' At that, I did notice the
man unloading a truck was wincing and the dark-
black smoke encircled his head. Right after that,
he fell down. Yes, yes, it appeared for sure : that
mongrel dog Death and all the village was burning.
-
'You've done this of spite, you stupid, evil man!'
Someone shouted that, as glass popped and shattered
from heat. Everywhere, things were blowing about
and some form of star-crazed fiery powder seemed
settling on all the street. People screamed and oaths
flew. I had never seen death for so many.
-
I sensed the trick of a Devil in this : a fiery plummet,
the crumbling of buildings a'flame, the piling of bodies
and rubble. The stealth of destruction was suddenly
brought out to the very forefront of things. An implosion,
as of minds in confusion falling upon themselves, seemed
descended on all things. I had never seen death for so many.

3194. SPEAK WITH CERTAINTY OF THINGS YOU KNOW NOTHING ABOUT

SPEAK WITH CERTAINTY
OF THINGS YOU KNOW
NOTHING ABOUT
I cantilevered the rainbow at 7-11.
I threw down the guns at Wawa.
The train kept leaving, and it
never arrived and some David
Bowie guy with mountain-wild
eyes addressed the waiting crowd
with his saliva. Somehow even
the Poetry Editor of The New Yorker,
old what's-his-name Muldoon, showed
up to play. Sackcloth in a library, and a
fondness for Yellow Moon. What is that
anyway but a name for newly-centric
forms of vodka, beer and well-tanked
wine? (The only vintage around here
worth saving has been already saved -
the guy with the saliva said that - and
the nicely-settled aardvark Ethan, he
ought to know the time at least).
-
Once before boarding the train I took
the elevator to the 4th floor to see Kristy.
And there she was and I should know;
in a tan shirt with eyes to match. I caught
on immediately that she wasn't looking
for me. All that closing the telephone call
'love ya' stuff, like girls wasting time in an
office while talking to a husband at Plato's
Retreat. All that vague and unknowing patter.
-
But, no matter. The moon falls to the horizon
and no one's counting any longer. So we sat
on the train and talked. The husband, she said,
being Danish, was always down about something -
all that long, darkness and nighttime stuff, 'like
growing up in a cardboard box' she said he says.
And then 'the only thing that gets him off is sex,
yeah, really.' I worried about that only later on
my own and lonely way home. 'And I myself,'
she further mentioned, 'kind'a hate it all, so I
suck a lot of dick.' Yeah, right, just like that;
I got where and was going, and got off, exiting
this (only now somewhat) aimless train.
-
It's like that at the Frick Collection too, as I
think of it now. The outdoor courtyard, where
sit the people who don't mind sweating, and
the ones indoors, clutching their tumblers
and drinks, who must, as they say, have
their air 'conditioned.' With me, it's either
way; I can take it from the bottom,
I can take it from the top.

3193. I RAN ROUGHSHOD

I RAN ROUGHSHOD

Never apologized for that to anyone;
ruined my parents both, lost all my
friends before that, shot pigeons and
squirrels with air guns and rifles, chased
after skirts and girls for their trifles.
Damn it all, my life was running good.
Then, I did four years in the workhouse
for dealing stolen cars, stealing government
property, kiting fake checks as well. Learned
more in there than I did on the street. Like
Hell, 'rehabilitation' tried to come calling.
I stole the car it drove in with.

3192. MAGNETO

MAGNETO

Rapid-fire declension extending lawns
into parks and parks into mansions; five
silly Mexicans riding the turf. Land-lubber
landscaping throwing arrows at birds and
arcing what we do not know at the mesas
and arroyos we never see. Do you not know,
Pablito, that we do not live those ways known
to you? Fresh-field grounds, both soggy and wet.
Oh, adobe-san, be not so foolish as to keep
trying to ruin the land we live amidst -
all for what you do not know.

3191. DO VARIED THINGS

DO VARIED THINGS
Run your mouth off at the hat,
eat your forkful of sideways
dirt, land your marigold on
the blooming gate, walk your
pond through the meadow
unleashed. Clean your dog
up after the mess, wear your
sidelocks atop your face.
Bring cookies to the bakery,
overdress the dead, find solace
in the sound of screech-cars
squealing. Never let the Mantis
know it's praying. Do varied
things, at all times,
varied things.

3190. HERE'S HOW WE MAKE THE TOAST

HERE'S HOW WE

MAKE THE TOAST
Here's how the mantelpiece rubbed arms
with the fire - oh, there was always something
amiss, yes, we all knew that. But no one ever
was speaking, and there were too many kings
and queens. I shaved my face, that morning,
with the license of freedom and desire. Yes,
it should be said, everything went smoothly.
-
But - a body asks - why? Why should
that be? How can that happen? And here,
as well, far beneath this railroad trestle,
this stupid Metro North right now along
the Hudson. Some distant rock hills,
those Jersey Palisades, stood
stern across the shore.
-
I wouldn't have known from nothing,
this Hudson River Line, taking me
right up to Beacon. And back down
again. What's that all about? I can't
say...now that all the Indian-natives
are gone, those campfire-blessed
locals who once dwelt along this
route, marching and huffing their
way across these icy, wintry paths.
Prosit. Long Life. Good Health!

3189. PHOTOGRAPH

PHOTOGRAPH

I might have known you would have made me nervous,
standing there alone and looking out. I saw your picture
once, and then again, along some seashore alcove, the
trembling waves breaking behind your form. It was
all I could do, smiling like that, to stay in place.
I gently lowered my aim, and fired. It was a
speeding bullet, on the way to my heart.

3188. GOING FORWARD SLOWLY

GOING FORWARD SLOWLY

Moving along : gale-strip wind-blown cover.
This minor shed shakes in the wind. Watch
the pale force moving; see the heavy branches
and all their leafy throws shake wildly in the air.
-
I reset my watch to Denmark time.
That distant, northern feeling, some
faint demitasse of a Scandinavian powder,
nothing of the South at all. No European
pure-blend, this. Those old, Italian cafe
flowers wither, even as I hear your name.
-
It is no fault of another, this wiry skeleton
of emotion and heart. I knew it would come
to be - at that North Sea wharf where I saw
so many faces looking out, just looking for
what was to come. An old idea, King Emlet,
now Hamlet to you, this scribbling bard,
this never-ending torture of a seaside wall.

3187. IF RINTRAH ROARS

IF RINTRAH ROARS
If Rintrah roars, and shakes His
fiery fist - who am I then, after
all, to object? Some Blakean God,
wanting to come home to roost,
return to origins, seek the source
anew, comes screaming right at
me, and through; well, better off,
then, just getting out of His way.
All that crazy God stuff unsettles
me anyway - and, let's face it -
He's got, for sure, His own hidden
agenda; wild and woolly, out of
control, and nothing considerate
of me, not at all.

3186. THINGS ARE NEVER WHAT THEY SEEM

THINGS ARE NEVER
WHAT THEY SEEM

Come with me, then. Let us notice the great
hundred things : the pantry in the parlor,
the lettuce on the cob, the wilt, the general
idea of - as it were - transfiguration.
-
When I was once small enough, younger
by far and as well, I watched, with my
father, a great conflagration - the roaring
flames bellowing black, and billowing too -
of a refinery fire or a gas-source gone mad,
running wild over the marshlands of
Staten Island. Nothing seemed to
matter, just burn instead.
-
I remember a crippled boy, then, too,
in his polio braces, coming over to where
we were, and asking for help at the water
fountain. He wanted a drink and was
hobbled by his handicap, hindered by
his braces. I didn't know, and couldn't
understand. That black scream on the
horizon had all my attention anyway.
-
But, then, he got his drink.
My strangely happy, good-deed
Dad had helped him. Smiles and
nods and thanks were exchanged.
The fire roared. The growing
crowd exclaimed.
-
Me, I was glad to be watching, to
being a presence, to be trying to
figure these things out. I realized
right then - things are never what
they seem. And I understood as well
the naming of all that we see : the
water to drink, the same water used
to put out flames? The nod to continue,
the same nod we'd exchanged? A
straight line is never more crooked
than after it has been called straight.

3185. HOUSEHAT PIPEFITTER

HOUSEHAT PIPEFITTER
Had I but left a penny out of place,
it would still be there on the morrow -
for that is how slowly things change,
nay, how really they do not change at
all. And you, silvered mirror, go on
always reflecting - if not yourself
then what it is yourself perceives
to see. A likable life enough.
-
Househat pipefitter - you
really should look at these
words, and pictures too.
There's no earthly
reason to ignore.

3184. DOMESTIC REALITY

DOMESTIC REALITY
Pudding, and putting out the lights.
Dog - none. Cat - food. Faucets, you
say, are off. Domestic bliss, don't scoff.
Feet up on the couch - now, please,
what's with that? Like that book?
I never brought it back.
-
You know, the one time she was
here before, she sat in that very
same spot. A lot like you. Funny,
how things are, like that too.
Well, OK, all done then, let's go.

3183. THE WISDOM OF THE SAINTS AND THE RHYTHM OF THE AGES

THE WISDOM OF THE
SAINTS and the
RHYTHM OF THE AGES
Take your pick : all the cards are on the table.
Norse sagas, Icelandic odes, Alaric and the
Goths, Romana Paxicana, fie, fie on both your
houses. Augustine and Benedict and Martin
Luther too. It's all and everywhere a shambles,
and sh-sh-shame on you. This old castle,
I only notice now, is built of newer nails.
-
Chambersburg and Hatteisford,
they both had the key. Drinking
whiskey from tumblers of glass,
we had the idea and we had a blast.
Now, a few weeks later, I awake still
groggy-eyed and realize it's 'civilzation'
itself stretched before me. All those old
lies and prevarications. Assassination
had to be. And, once more, take your
pick, all the cards are on the table.

3182. MIDDLESEX FELLS AND THE BLUE HILLS

MIDDLESEX FELLS
AND THE BLUE HILLS
Picking at your Merino wool, I simply wonder why.
The long sky is darkest blue, almost perfect in hue,
and it seems as well to stretch for nineteen hundred
miles. If ever these eyes are glazed or waxen, it is
only because - if that's the case - I'm dead. In any
other circumstance, my purely human attention
remains riveted. Every star is, let's say, my source
of wonder. And now I turn to landscape.
-
Every picture ever made is but a semblance of
beauty; an attempt, however feeble, at something
recognizable so as to portray what we ideally
would live. Even all those Turners and Constables,
they put forth the very same message each time.
The world is a seminal vestige of Eden, and we
all are yet living in Paradise. Hard to prove, OK,
but what else is science about? All that feeble
conjecture, like a protuberance, some wart,
on a fractious Devil's nose.

3181. PUTTING IT ALL OFF

PUTTING IT ALL OFF
Going through the paces : stained glass
blue light illuminated from outside with
light-rays coming in. Reds and greens
as well. A regular La Farge fire. The
uneven sidewalk seemed buckling too
with people. Big, crazy late June flowers
arching over table and chair and the
doorway itself nearly hidden. I looked
around - once more - for anything I
would recognize; saw only you and
heard the noise from the distant lawn.
And, yes, right then in my loneliness
I decided to watch the Sun rise, watch
it rise as if for the very first time
on a very distant planet on the very
first morning, somewhere I'd never
been before. No more putting it off.

3180. WORKING THAT CLOSE TO THE FIRE

WORKING THAT CLOSE

TO THE FIRE
What would you have me do? Bubble-gum
angle-iron steel girder up above. A workman,
no different say than Adam or Cain or Abel,
whatever, is going about his stupid task : while
breathing a heavy dose, spitting a Coke, picking
at a sandwich, talking about his wife, and, as well,
splitting hairs about every little thing. I awarded
him the golden plaque for 'One Useless Endeavor.'
-
Wednesday was the final day at home. I listened
all the while he told his story. She was leaving,
his 'ever faithless cock-sucking whore of a wife,'
and taking the kid as well. Her new guy lived
in Belmar, and had a dick the size of a thimble,
he'd bet. He owned a three-room beachfront
bungalow, and the kid loved it there. The wife,
he didn't know and couldn't care. He hoped
she 'liked being a slave to a little dick.'
-
Whew! I sensed something amiss here, some
fearsome rage about to explode. Pity that
sandwich, pity that hammer, pity that load.
His co-workers as well - I thought of them.
What must they think, having to work
that close to the fire all day?

3179. IT WAS A TIME OF SENSE

IT WAS A TIME OF SENSE

I made millions making nothing; the
tired birds were singing in the sky, the
lark larked and the wren wren'd. Or
whatever they do. High overhead, a
jet or two tore open the sky, drawing
like a pen-mark a white strip in the
blue. I barely changed my pose in
looking up. By the fence, two girls
were talking about something -
funny, by the way they were
laughing. A broad and effusive
boredom seemed the order
of the day. I knew not why,
but just went on.

3178. PRAIRIE HOUSE (frank lloyd wright takes off)

PRAIRIE HOUSE

(frank lloyd wright takes off)
Carrying the bulk past Promontory Point,
hauling water to the top, great arches 'midst
Richardsonian splendor, all that crazed
American space. I don't know where to turn,
as, all around me, rocks and ledges and subterfuge
and ceilings stretch. The fireplace, though now
settled, itself roars blazing flames. Everything
seems amiss, all these Columbia'd plains. I
seek nothing more : self-reliance, a cove,
a simple place to hide me out.

3177. THE CAPERED CONVENTION

THE CAPERED CONVENTION

Fifteen different men went to deepest Africa,
in nineteen hundred and ten. That was all, and
that was wild. Diffused and derelict their good
intentions were, though nothing of any worth
got done. I sit me down now only to listen.
-
A small man sat down at the piano and played.
He tried steadfast alertness and an accompanying
air of serious thought. I watched him carefully
until he was done. I got up when he got up.
-
I lost my faith in God and man when I was eleven.
It has never returned - I am saddled with bitter
thoughts and anger too. That is my music; I read
the notes as a carpenter reads his plans. Scribed
lines and pencilled markings. All together, things
as one. I sit me down now only to listen.

3176. SOME PEOPLE

SOME PEOPLE
Some people dance, some people waltz,
some people scale fences and others take falls.
I want to be neither nor any of them. I'd rather
my force was spent building bridges to your heart,
scaling heights into your mind, rising the crest of
every cloud that floats its blinding way past you.
In Winter, yes, it may be, I too wait for snow -
scanning the dark gray skies for what is coming,
what has been announced, the wind, the flakes
and flurries first, and then the massive storm and
all the things that have been announced. Though
it doesn't always work, it gets me by. In Summer,
quite the other way, I hide from blinding sunlight
in the day and seek instead a respite in the shades and
the shadows of night. Things come on like bullets -
fast and piercing, cutting bone and limb , slicing hearts
in two, sundering what all was once together. And, yes,
it goes that way - even then the seeming fit still fits.

3175. TOO MUCH LIKE DEATH

TOO MUCH LIKE DEATH
Uncle Wiggly says the carousel is broken.
He should know - he usually fixes everything
with his hands. Rough, endless hands, big
gnarled fingers seen never using a tool.
If anyone can get it going again, he can for
sure. 'Travel light' was always his motto.
I always nodded, knowing that I never
really go anywhere so it wouldn't matter
anyway. Then, the day of the locusts, just
like that, one day arrived. I looked for him
everywhere and - just like God - he was
gone. There hasn't been thunder nor
lightning nor miracles since. No fire
in the bramble, none of that stuff. The
world (oh figmented, overwraught,
contentious thing), has became a
very serene place. Uncle Wiggly
saw to that.

3174. FINGER-POST AT MAIN

FINGER-POST AT MAIN
The last salacious cat from Waldenmire
just came smashing through here, yelling
about overhearing the maid and her consort
chilling open bottles of wine on the 28th floor.
'Why, why?' he screamed, 'not this, no more!'
-
I went home early, since I'd gotten there late.

3173. KEEPING ALL MY SECRETS TO MYSELF

KEEPING ALL MY
SECRETS TO MYSELF
It's a very limited engagement, and
I wouldn't count on it at all - lots of
lights go out, cars are targeted, and
- what's more - the gargantuan sieve
of altercations and lies takes its place
in front. So, anyway, be careful what
you wish for, as it all may come true,
or if not true than to be. Until then,
I'm keeping all my secrets to myself.
-
Walk on water, tie things down.
Keep the marker, mess the crown.
The tree-men, and the sunlight -
throwing green apples down to
the water below. I'm keeping
all my secrets to myself.

3172. NOT OF SOUND

NOT OF SOUND
I am not of sound mind. I am
of very sound mind. I am not
there. I am right over there.
I make no noise. My noise is
of sound and fury. I am full
of regret. I have no regrets.
No regrets at all.

3171. ROMANCE

ROMANCE
I went to Namen Brook to
drown you, and I failed. Yes,
you gurgled and you sputtered,
and I thought I'd done it right -
your pale, blue eyes rolled back,
I watched, you gasped, and that
fine, female chest, it heaved.
Thinking it was over, I guess I
stopped too soon. No matter,
even after all of that, you
claim still to love me dearly.

3170. LUCKY ONE LAST THING

LUCKY ONE LAST THING
From Syosset to Patagonia - how
far is that? The rooms are all cleaned,
freshly swept and polished. We've already
had our apple a day. Jesus Good God
too the world keeps spinning and the
yarns keep flowing. The man with the
heady drink, he keeps drinking. Over
at 147 e15th, even Susan Sarandon is
watching the clock, shining its face,
feeding the cat, and - lucky one
last thing - marching her
foibles to the beat of time.

3169. PLAYLIST

PLAYLIST
Gone run down stark-raving crazy
now you are was then I me. Got stopped
(just like that) when the message came.
To bear witness. I speak - as a survivor
last among survivors all and each of whom
thought to swear they too were last. So, so
we are not then alone. So what?
-
'We can't be silent! We must give evidence!
My God, we have been witness!' - so Barney,
worked up, said. And (yet) I said nothing in
return. Conclusion (they said) was - 'we've got
to face the facts. We've got to know what happened.'
(I said) 'Don't you know?' (They said)
'well..yes...and....no!'
-
It's never easy being a sham, Sam, though
they try. Run down stark-raving crazy.
Why don't you come down for ransom?
I've heard you like the kids.

3168. THE ORIGIN OF THE WORLD (Courbet)

THE ORIGIN OF
THE WORLD

(Courbet)
Just like Courbet to show so
sternly the rights and the wrongs
of this place : displaced and watery
souls, still bloody, struggling through
space. It's harsh, like the black caw
of a raven, picking through trash
at the dawn of yet another day.
I see the familiar in so ordinary
a way. Oh, oh, leave it to Courbet.

3167. REALLY GOING NOWHERE AT ALL

REALLY GOING

NOWHERE AT ALL
On my cataclysmic affairs, on my
datebook of time, on my honor, on my
reprieve, on my insistence, I will never
aver. This is a distant nomenclature.
This is a rising anger. This is Despair.
-
There : I see. That small, young boy is
bouncing that large, round ball, which,
thrown to hoop, there remains at rest
for but a moment, a secondary space
of time, nay, too, an instant, before
failing and deciding then to drop.
Which the young boy retrieves.
-
Oh clouds like pterodactyls raging -
cut a'fly along the sky - roaring with
a snappish cut aligned to fear and anger,
as if suitcased all for travel but really
going nowhere at all. Really,
going nowhere at all.

3166. LIFEFORCE

LIFEFORCE

I structured my horizontal frame.
I structured you. I structured, thus,
the world. You are, at long last, the
enchantment that brings me forth.
Now, so derived, this riverbank
flows as its water runs : Gently
Sweet Afton or Bard of Avon.
No, no, I wouldn't know, and
both my sleeves are dipped in
it, my cape arrives in tatters,
and I am - sorely now - bereft
of any allegiance at all. Yet, once
more, you are the enchantment
that brings me forth.

3165. YOU REMIND ME

YOU REMIND ME

You remind me of someone I met.
Someone I met on the couch.
Last week. You. Do. Near the
apple garden, not yet in bloom,
the 'orchard' the field-sign called
it. Like we didn't already know.
Right near to that, you may
recall, was the pond. But, oh
dear, I'm mistaken again.
That wasn't you. Rather, just
someone I met then of whom
you remind me of now.

3164. OH THERE WAS A MATTER

OH THERE WAS A MATTER

:I: sit back sideways. :I: am reading
John Ashbery once more. There's
never a limit to things like this.
Convex mirrors and the rest.
:I: drink nothing but coffee
around both man and beast.
Around that which once was
called the 'fairer' sex :I: most
often find myself drinking
NOTHING at all.

3163. TALLOW

TALLOW

Markers along the treeside, high atop the hills;
where crested woodpeckers yet sing and the
high-vaulted fly-hawks soar. A long and
patterned time below. The land rolls on
before us : rocks as old as what is said are
still lined atop these ancient heaps - old lines
and scratched marks of this and that entreaty
from a hundred years before. I can hear the
bold echoes yet running. A distant light
marks the curvature of this Earth.
-
My mind and my vision drip - as a waxen
image too close to the Sun; softening and losing
shape, sliding down into inconsequential forms
and meanings without meaning. My soul talks
back and somehow yet I know I am alive.
Far, far off, just where I can no longer see,
I sense the distant river curving away.

3162. ASHBURNIPAL

ASHBURNIPAL

'Well then you come do it - smoky sky on
a broken horizon. Have I ever told you how
I feel? Legal sanction now awaits me -
I can hinder what you unreel. The last
farrago at the final moment, and all that
foolish cheering for none. Go ahead then,
see if I care. You will do what you will,
whatever and a day.'
-
'Stop your stinking sacrifices. Your smells make
me retch - your flesh and your carcasses, dead
loins and fire-burned lambs. Offerings such as
these? I'd rather have Baal's lonesome daughter.
There are no words, really, for what you are.'
-
Then I will stop saying your name. The day of the
Lord is here. The readings must stop, the lists
are pronounced, and all those names of the
already-dead, that long roll-call of prisoners,
must we sit here and listen to it once more?
Grant me dispensation, oh God, to leave
your house and fade away.

3161. (ALL) PILED UP DARK

(ALL) PILED UP DARK
I went through Ealing, Epping,
and Slough, and Bradford and
Spalding too - all that old
Vaudeville circuit, now near
finished and gone, emptied of
clowns, and blackface, and
jesters, and cons. All the old
ballrooms had fallen down, the
tentcamps were gone - all that
were left were the surreptitious
failures of broken windows and
crumbling closets, the dives of
old Devils in Hell, carparks and
fractures and more : just one thing
after another, all piled up dark.

3160. MIS-FAVOR

MIS-FAVOR
Yes, yes, now the Gods are armed
with their many new charms. A
gallantry of novelty, long before the
new wears off. Electrons warding off
danger, neutrons slaking thirst,
dark matter, black holes. These
Gods have many arms. How
well they manipulate things.

3159. AND THEN I SAW NOTHING AT ALL

AND THEN I SAW
NOTHING AT ALL
I am so small - startled as well -
among all these tall and darkening
men; the ones with wishstones on
their brooms and carnage upon
each of their faces. 'We've lost
entire families to boom and bust,
to make and waste, the bombed
out billets of border and line.
It's all been maddeningly so.'
Saying that, once more he
threw his lit match onto his
pile of gasoline cuttings. 'If
you wish to continue believing
it's all been allegory and
apocrypha, go right ahead.
Your funeral, Bud!' The flames
shot wildly higher. 'The Damnation
Conflagration, I call it!'
-
There really was nothing to do.
I'd read all that stuff before - lists
and plagues and first-born slaughtered
boys - all gibberish to me as well. Frogs
and locusts and strange odors of Death
upon nightmares of dreams. Yes, I'd
been all there and done all that. Now
some crummy, waning Lordship wishes
to come right at me? I'd think better of
the chipmunk than the tree. 'No thanks!'
I said. 'I couldn't hear you the first time,
and when it finally came around, man, I
was really busy.' I noticed a hummingbird
buzzing the feeder. And then I saw
nothing at all.

3158. THAT'S FOR SURE

THAT'S FOR SURE
Only by the glint of
both manner and
hard work are all
the things we really
treasure made.

3157. STATION IDLE

STATION IDLE
Before the extinguished day
dissolves away, that single light
will go out. It too has been on for
so many hours; a thin, yellow
bath on one, very old, posted
schedule signboard.

3156. SOMEONE'S UTTER CONFLAGRATION

SOMEONE'S UTTER
CONFLAGRATION
There are just so many ways to skin a cat -
though there are more than one - and we've
probably seen them all. Watching transfixed
at some late-night TV image playing, over
and over, that shot to the head, the assassin's
video, the long-range leap to someone's death.
Tall buildings pale by comparison, even if
they do gently bend down to swoop up
the jumper. It's more of the same, what the
eyes see or foretell. The contagion loop
of expectation, like that famed rock wall
surrounding Riverdale itself, where the
old 'Injuns lost it all, nay, gave it up,
walked away having lost - yet again -
right before the slaughter, another
parcel of land; something they
didn't know about at all.

3155. THIS IS MY JUMBLE AND I AM THE ONE

THIS IS MY JUMBLE

AND I AM THE ONE
Nothing like this : ruminate the floy, calculate
the chaos, bring home the source. The Mayflies,
long gone now, are dead as well. Listen - there,
the tinkling of that churchyard bell on the hillside,
it means another 7am Mass is being run. Some
cadaverous lecher of a priest, and his two altar boys
caking the magnificent for a few elderly women sunk
down in the pews. This goes on forever, all the detritus
of a lower world. I resign myself to nothing more.
-
Sink me down, just as well, in the cases of
mis-chanced fury I've witnessed here. The 7th
Street flowerings, the two cops beating a hoodlum
senseless, the pretty girls twirling their rainbows
on the Washington Street pavement, hollow horrors
filling their veins. I remember seeing Rudy Grillo,
just before he died, like a heroin ghost leaning on
Death's fence. He wanted to see, but could no longer
focus. It was just like the end of the world, for him,
and for me. Now it's all nothing but some Dalmation
story being told over and over and more. Jack and Jill
went up the hill and Jill, it seemed, came tumbling down.
-
I lost the story, I lost the honor, I lost my broken
arm, I lost my daughter. How far should any of
this carry? I look at those old pictures, all so well
and all so bright. I want to be somewhere else,
and then I realize, alas, I probably already am.
This is my jumble, and I am the one.

3154. AIR (first day of Summer)

AIR
(first day of Summer)
There's only so much I can tell - I've done my
Hamlet and my Tempest too. Perhaps Macbeth
and King Lear await, though I would not know.
As long as Andronicus looms not nearby.
No froth now, mind you, let us speak
strongly of those things we may. Your
cut-out clouds are lining the sky;
like paper formations, they hover.

3153. I REALLY NEED YOUR HELP

I REALLY NEED
YOUR HELP
(madness)
If I could just cut through, get
someone to listen; but no, no, no,
my words are dead on the wharf -
sinister movements and the
dead-heading sailor asleep
on the creosote post. And
I am sorry for that.
-
I bead-buckled my final cadaver,
lit my last torch and singled-over
my final double-indemnity, sitting
like Boethius in my solitary cell
for you and the rest of your sainted
Mankind all, going about your
wayward ways : now park that
car, now make that call.
-
It does seem, these days, that people
really are born already on the phone,
jabbering their junk all right from the
very start. By contrast, my pale
temperature boils. I miss, oh dearly,
my pleated shirt and all that it
brought forth; its glory, it solid
inattention to detail and form.
-
But now, having reached my own
impasse and crossed the station
over to my own mental ward, I
ask - do you know any of what
I mean? Why Dilling finally
blew his head off? Here, here,
I really need your help.
-
If there again was just someone to listen,
someone to hear me out, then those
thrumming registers of low sound
would be howling instead my own
forceful name - astound, absurd,
wastrel child me. They've made
a ring-coil from but letters of
my name. Let's try and forget
the doubt. Just go. I really
need your help.
-

Dandelion millweed tiger's paw.
Decibel departure Miami suture.
Everything like this, brought
together at last. What a ghastly,
ghastly world. I really, really
need your help.

3152. MIRABILE DICTU

MIRABILE DICTU
I wonder never long about anything
at all. It's amazing, it's a wonderful world!
Starlight and the sun, both together mixed,
are generated with my very blood and tissue'd
form. I am all that which I step. My feet are in
the Earth and of the land I walk - implanted,
to the land, as my head is to the stars. Mirabile
dictu and wonders of all that! Amazing!
It's a wonderful world!

3151. THE FUTURE WAS NOTHING LIKE THIS

THE FUTURE WAS
NOTHING LIKE THIS
I remember you went to Pittsburgh -
blue pants, a funny hat, sunglasses
and all that driving. You said it made
you feel young - 'being out on the
road, moving along, owing no man
no thing.' I liked that way of a phrase
you had - a glide, a quick and a glib
tongue. 'Owing no man no thing,' I
thought, was pretty unique. Most
people probably would have said
instead - 'owing nobody nothing'
or maybe 'I don't own nothing to
nobody.' I hope you understand
what I'm trying to say.
-
Blue glass, blue Pittsburgh glass.
'PPG they call it!' That's what
you said - craning your neck
sky-high out the driver's window,
watching things go by - wind in
your hair, wind in your eyes (which
the glasses hid). Funny to see you
steer, at sixty miles an hour and more,
with but the tip of your index finger.
-
'Mostly, I want for nothing. That
sounds great, yeah, I know, like I'm
rich and can have everything. No way,
man - it's actually the opposite. So
freaking broke that I've learned now
to want for nothing, 'cuz I can't have it.
Get it? Just to get by.' Yeah, the future,
back then, was nothing like this.

3150. MY HEART'S FIRE

MY HEART'S FIRE

I kindle my heart's own fire with love,
flighting fiery sticks like arrows straight
to someone else's heart. Kiss me world, I
kiss back. Open my palms, famed nirvana,
I start fires with my thoughts - tongues
of flame leaping my open hands. Heart to
heart to enter Love. Call me ever, call me
thus, bring me forth, cause my lust. I am the
blazing one, coming forth now to save the world.

3149. ALLAH BE PRAISED

ALLAH BE PRAISED

Marksman deadly accurate shot man head
right between the Nairobi eyes. The girl
with the blues, the one I love, just washing
her hair with some new-found sludge. In
my dreams, she's shattered by rocks while
sunk in the sand, like those Middle Eastern
Muslim perverts stoning broken virgins.
God almighty what a petty world you've
made - all those mighty assholes proclaiming
what they say. Rights and freedom gone away
in a death and slavery here to stay. Pigeon-headed
Gods come crying, all that Allah Yahweh Jesus shit. Look
at what they've done with it, just look at what they've done.

3148. YEAH, I CELEBRATE MYSELF?

YEAH, I CELEBRATE MYSELF?

Make no stinking rationale for where the street ends up :
willow tree sagging over the marsh, the end of the block
slimy with crud, the old metal swing set sinking in mud.
The old sanitarium, now a condo-set, makes me laugh
still every time I pass - Cherokee Arms, now it's called.
Big bunches of Puerto Ricans stabbing the park with
love; Jets and Sharks and Houseboys and Wrens.
-
I dare somehow saddle up this horse and ride, and slide -
East River metamorphose right there into me. Tugboat
pushing barge, sloop and craft, slighting, listing
pleasure boats. Two cranked girls in little white
bikinis, sunning their ass on deck. I went home,
and there was no one there. I went there, and
there was no one here. All my friends are dead
and gone. No father, no mother as well.
-
I find that I rot and stink with the rest of them all.
Laying back in the sunny grass, feet up on a railing,
watching birds and squirrels scuttle and run. I don't
care that I don't care and I don't care if I should care.
Or not. That rotten weasel apple-mazaneer, the
man with the plaid-silk hat, no I do not know him,
have never seen before. That dog he's walking,
Jeez, looks more like a cow. I smile, languid to
a fault, and celebrate. I celebrate, myself?
Them? The world around me? All.

3147. BAUDELAIRE'S ALBATROSS

BAUDELAIRE'S ALBATROSS
Why here in these crazy, frozen wastes?
Why now in this ice? What makes me think
now of these sudden and remembered things?
Like the albatross of Baudelaire's poem, tethered,
and with those big wings drooping deckside while
captive and tied, the sad and awful paradigm of
limitations holds me down as well. I am as if
frozen in some cumbersome block of ice.
-
'Its great white wings drag at its sides like a
pair of unshipped oars' - that's how he says
it exactly. Broken, defamed and unsettled
spirit, hold still. I hurt by just the thinking.
-
My mirage, as well, it would seem is solid
and heavy; holding me down the same.
The ice and the mentor'd fantasy, they
are both working to rule me, settled,
broken, defamed. Unsettled as well?
Yes, yes, both myself do well define.

3146. ORION'S MIGHTY BELT

ORION'S MIGHTY BELT
As difficult as right now though all may seem,
so in contrast my lightened spirit soars. The
nighttime heavens above, Orion's mighty belt,
the roaming, wielding, shooting stars, the
asteroids and planets - all that rich, thick and
textured blemish of my conscious life - brings
me out, lifts, propels, takes me with it. I am
off, to such a gloried atmosphere as no one
pale astronomer, none, has ever seen. This
is a rich and brilliant happiness, one to wish
for, gloat over and strive ever towards,
(as difficult as that all may seem).

3145. NIAGARA

NIAGARA
(search results for Niagara Falls)
I'm sitting at the rainbow window watching
water fall down - colored mist and white sky
flying high, Good God! And here come a
Troupermania Trio singing on : some putrid
folk songs last heard in 1964 - 'freight train,
freight train, goin' so fast...' Old Libba Cotten
herself couldn't have sung it no worse, and
that would be 1905 'til now. I'm sitting at
the rainbow window just wanting to smile -
freight train, freight train, to 500 miles.
-
The mist fogs gladly the gadfly glass -
sends shimmers and ripples along, all things
glazed, it seems, with something; akin, that is
to this : folk songs in an old time lodge and,
below, the Maid of the Mist! Please don't tell
what train I'm on, so they won't know I'm gone.
-
Freight train, freight train, goin' so fast,
how did I come to this at last?

3144. NEW PRESENCE AND NOW

NEW PRESENCE AND NOW
I have entered the unfound world :
syllogism silence logic and sense.
How often the lone bell ringing sounds,
bereft of the ordinary context; a cuckoo
without manners, a vane without any
suitable wind. I have entered the
unfound world : syllogism silence
logic and sense. What things together
coalesce. I wear a cloak as finery and dress;
and humbled such a servant is. I carry
the new reality all with me as I leave.

3143. TYRANT (he is not a one, but a many)

TYRANT
(he is not a one, but a many)
Yes, yes, the tyrant sounds!
It is good to kill - most times -
what things need killing. Do you
now understand? Arise for the
ramparts to slay this new King.
Yes, yes, the tyrant sounds!
And yes, in a spite, he must die
and his voices, all, must fall.

3142. AND NOW THIS NEW OVERTURE BECKONS

AND NOW THIS
NEW OVERTURE BECKONS
We set out for the open sea,
in a leaky, shitty craft. The
journey was 70 years long,
so they said, and we steered
wherever we were headed.
Winds blew fierce or sometimes
not at all. We took refuge in a
million shoals and narrows;
illusory, not really there,
and - always - gone
before tomorrow
arrived.

3141. RIMBAUD

RIMBAUD
I've waltzed like a retard covering
'Last Year's Man' - strumming along
with Wind At the Oasis playing chords
blindly insensate. All these mannered
rhythms going nowhere, and I am not
myself, I am someone else.

3140. LEICESTER TROLLEY

LEICESTER TROLLEY
Until the robin's egg runs dry
and silt fills up the borders,
that's how long I'll stay to wait
for you : holding air in a watery
palm, forsaking other moments
for now and only this alone.
The Leicester Trolley Bus
just went by. I should
really take it home.

3139. PENNSYLVANIA DUCKLING FARMHOUSE

PENNSYLVANIA

DUCKLING FARMHOUSE
I can't write more than my hand allows -
ragweed ragamuffin chandelier doctor.
These aren't just figments that play on
the wall - flowers and carriages and
one old, red barn. Why, why, why then
do people continue : homily to heritage
and all that nostalgia for what's gone,
when nothing will really do at all, nothing?

3138. WITNESS

WITNESS

An unwrapped gauze of circumstance, he held tight to
the green-painted railing. Some blood was trickling
from his mouth and his small hat had fallen from
his head. Next to him, a man with a ukulele was
stupidly singing on, as if nothing untoward was
occurring. Some standard of sub-standard uselessness
was making itself felt. On the ceiling tiles, the light
was refracted into false rainbows, a scattering of broken
light and rays of indistinct texture. Learning long ago
to have nothing and live with that, I offered no resistance
to what appeared to be fighting back - a variety of
useless and awkward bile. Thinking to myself, in a
telegraphic fashion, 'was this the way things always
are?' I ascribed new meaning to the moment : disgust,
disfavor, and a dissimilitude of want and need - neither of
them representing, really, anything at all. I watched
another man spit as he sauntered by. More waves of
revulsion swept over me. Short of Death, only a gun
would do justice to this scene. Calamity, I saw finally,
now had a nation, a land, and a kingdom of its own.

3137. THE GARDENER'S GOOD TRUCK

THE GARDENER'S
GOOD TRUCK
It was morning, and the wet grass was flooding
my shoes; the lone sentinel of a hawk looked
down from atop an elm, beseeching the world
below to deliver Death to it. Never bidden,
Death arrives; just another roadkill bird to
remember its cry. All was peaceful and still,
and then the gardener's good truck rolled by.
-
We are so bemused by things, and we just
keep going : the Ferris Wheel round in the
sky, still lit up, turning, from the night before.
The abandoned fairgrounds, now quiet and still,
merely dances eerily, its fabrics and tents
blowing in the wind, with not a word from all
those sleeping carnies in their drowsing tents
and trailers. Why, or why not? No difference.
-
And then the gardener's good truck comes rolling by -
trailing a flag and a container of spray poison, and
something else alike to fertilize the ground and
kill the weeds. Ah, so, then we should all reach
such lucky a station : the gardener's good truck,
the riven tents, the slaughtered bird, and the hawk.

3136. A BETTER FIT

A BETTER FIT
That train, with its black and charcoal tower,
moves through the air with smoke and power.
It pushes things around as it slices through
this world. Huddled all atop it, and all along
its sides, those crying hordes of Calcutta
and Delhi, the hunched and broken forms
of distant lands : they stay in place, wailing,
as they are dragged through this swirl in
time. I watch from a platform at that which
I cannot partake. Squeamish, I blanch at the
image. My token time, this iron before wheels,
is made - by contrast - of skyscrapers and
grime, of window glass and riches and
returns; great bevies of money and tables
set with crystal and gold. That contrast
is striking (truth to be told), and I can
only shudder as I walk away. The clinging
men, I watch them in their robes and
colored silks. Their mouths, in a grimace,
say something, but I cannot the language,
ascertain, and my silence is a better fit.

3135. OVER

OVER
I am in a foreign land. I am outside, without
language, without understanding. I am wop
kike, nigger, hunky, chink. I am all the rest.
My words have no effect and no one - not
a one - understands what I attempt to say.
I am distant. I am kraut. I am spic. I am frog.
What can you lend me? What can you extend
my way? I spread out my hands to you, to
ask, to beseech, to beg. I am loser. I am
dying. I am dead. Will you remember
these words when you yourself are
gone? Will you take a moment to
think of me, in absence? Wash the
sick? Clean the sores of the dying?
Before it is all over, it is
already too late.

3134. ONE LAST VISIT

ONE LAST VISIT
One last visit to these highlands intact,
before the brazen light of day hits the
painted wall - the sad surf tumbles,
leaving its trail behind, shining shards
on darkened sand. High above, some
leftover daylight moon witnesses
silently this oceanic parade.
-
I am here, in a cubicle of dark, of
my own. I can sense the departure
of each wave, every breaker pouring
forth, in the same way words flow.
Now if I can only listen. For what
reason only they know, mad gulls
emblazon their time with noise.
-
So many things matter.
So many others do not.

3133. DAYBREAK

DAYBREAK
I saw two deer at daybreak dancing -
as light they stepped across the road,
just ahead of me, in a balletic frisson
of stately grace and a very composed
inner fury. Eyes lit, ever sentinel,
looking. For that moment, in the grass,
they stopped and, with a graceful
twist each of the neck, stared back
at me, over their shoulders watching,
while the sky, in a gentle light,
transformed itself slowly to day.

3132. SO TO RAISE THE HACKLES

SO TO RAISE THE HACKLES

...And pump the fucking post, mail the water
in hats, generate the overflow which winds
up in the gutter. Where the rubber meets
the road. It's two-twenty-nine, I see, and
yet again the old guy is sitting there reading
the newspaper from Trenton : "Man screws
rubber ducky hidden in child's hand! Three
scrawny cops in whorehouse scam! High
school proms run amok!" It's almost
always the same - all those high crimes
and misdemeanors in a ten-year-old's
game. I merely note the time of day
to show : nothing ever changes, and
we are - ever - all the same.
(No, no, I take it back. They
can all go to Hell!).

3131. SOUTHERN GREENFIELDS

SOUTHERN GREENFIELDS
Mount Holly and a million words
and new South Jersey towns, all
between nothing at all : clams and
glassworks, each betokened thing,
over the ages, alas, and now gone.
The last of the baymen's huts, they
just told me yesterday, were burned
in '83; nothing else, no one else to see -
in this empty town, in this empty, barren
place, in this awful vacancy. Someone
is playing music, way out on the sand.
I hear that awful racket like it was right
here in my hand. This modern day, so
much to see, they have so much to say.
This awful town, this awful, barren
place, this empty vacancy.

3130. THE PLEDGES AT GREENWARD

THE PLEDGES
AT GREENWARD
Standing straight like trees,
in uniforms and stripes, these
soon-to-be oligarchs and routed
little soldiers take their pledges,
salute, and shine; and insist
on marching away.

3129. THE TREND OF MOLLY

THE TREND OF MOLLY
(reasons for Molly seeing)
Molly paints, Molly pants.
Molly faints, Molly glances.
Molly has a million good
reasons for being.
And, alongside that,
everything pales
by comparison.
(More reasons for
Molly : seeing).

3128. PIPER, PIPING

PIPER, PIPING

Having been baked in your Vicarene, I lost all
awareness of place and time : carnage and murder
meant nothing to me. The lost wages of sin, or
whatever that was I'd read in your viclactic book,
escaped me now. Looking around, I only saw clouds
and, from them, the distant birds in and out. My mind
had lost all sense of time. I wandered, aimless myself,
just as any one of those middling clouds. 'Piper, piping,
sing me wild, sing a song both fair and mild.'

3127. FOR CAMILLE

FOR CAMILLE

Jeez no Jeez almighty. Don't
say stuff like that - too much
bug spray in Avenel. Goodness
gracious not. I remember times
as well, just like that, rolling an
endless ball down Livingston Ave.,
chasing the Ford Diamond along
Clark Place, writhing with the
simians at Demorest and Pike.
Remember, I want to tell you,
remember, even if it's deep like
good coffee, you might like tea
better. I'm sorry for that, Camille.
You know, it was Abe Lincoln who
said, in a crappy Virginia hotel, to
the waiter who brought him some
really bad brew: 'Sir, if this is coffee,
bring me tea. If this is tea,
I'll have coffee instead.'

3126. THE SIGNIFIER HITS PAYDIRT

THE SIGNIFIER

HITS PAYDIRT
(down at tompkins square park)

Long tall Sally and the little red Corvette,
they're both sitting 'midst weeds down by
the dock : sick of everything and just
wasting away. The game is in overtime,
the crowd's beginning to trickle out, and I'm
watching movies on the infield wall.
-
Helene Krempa and some Nicole Kidman
lookalike doing gymnastics on the schooner
Mirage. High seas and misdemeanors too.
A couple of miles off shore, and, damn, you
can get away with anything at all.
-
The guy in the Big Beat sweater, that's me.
It's 1966 again, and once more I'm down by
Tompkins Square; kissing four-eyed angels
named Margaita and Rosalita. They've got
a nasty brother they call Pabolito, but he's
away in the Vietnam War. Lucky me.
-
I pick up the loaded dice.
Somehow (beats the hell out
of both them AND me)
I roll a twenty-three.
Down at Tompkins
Square Park, just
them and me.

3125. TWICE (in the ring they flipped, and the mind was unsettled, like America)

TWICE

(in the ring they flipped, and the
mind was unsettled, like America)
1. People work while things happen
and the massive tree houses a squirrel
as the sunlight rights itself through these
branches - or as much of them as I can
see. Rough bark torn and scarred still
shuddering with some rude shock now
so grown over and forgotten, like our
own bedeviled birth. Oh the Earth
is our loom as the fabric is doom!
-
(In the ring they flipped, and the
mind was unsettled, like America).
-
2. People work while things happen.
The massive tree houses a squirrel.
The sunlight rights itself through the
branches, or as much of them as I
can see. A rough bark, torn and scarred,
still shudders with some rude shock, now
grown over and forgotten - like our own
bedeviled birth. Oh the Earth is our
loom, and the fabric is doom.
-
(I see Marienne with two fingers
hold open the slipping door).

3124. MADE TO STAY

MADE TO STAY
(henry street settlement, nyc, 1970)

These things are made for fondling;
the entire patchwork quilt of it all.
Listen decidedly hard, transient one:
the night is made for crying, the milk is
made for spilling. Outside the Ken-Ken
Dairy Bar, where three old Jews are
still smarting from their memories,
a new form of consumption takes
over their eyes. 'We shall have this
land, now as it is, or we shall have
nothing.' The other person - her
name was Mara Kein - barely sat
down on the steps to weep before
the others walked away; not a
dry eye in the house after that.

3123. THE QUERULOUS

THE QUERULOUS
'Mind you, faction; all
those listed and adumbrated.
The wild bridge crosses an even
wilder river, and the sunlight
now grazes the two. I am here,
standing beside myself, watching
and questioning all that I see.'

3122. PALATINE (the mystery deepens)

PALATINE
(the mystery deepens)
As Rome was built upon Palatine Hill,
so too shall I stand sparsely and only
later grow atop my own ruins. Eight
meters deep, perhaps, and more,
these ancient soils amass and pile,
deepening both the mystery and the
ruin. The abject and the flaunted -
a white-marble enclosure around
the rim of a fuller disclosure.

3121. I AM NOW IN AMERICA

I AM NOW IN AMERICA
Tease me, taser, televised all,
from Tulane to Tuscaloosa. I am
- just like that image - ten new
feet tall. And out of joint as ever.
All the old caves and by-ways are
gone. That forest closes me in.
From the straight road (yes) I
woke to find myself (yes) alone
in a dark wood. And I say (yes,
yes!) what wood that was! Its
very meaning gives shape to fear.
-
Damn Dantean scowl, kept wrapped
and cloistered here at home: for whatever
reason we ride, those selfsame voices be.
They speak of rogue and habit, neither
of place nor strange. And, ah! how
ordinary now all things have become.
So rank, so rank, so arduous then,
this wilderness left behind us.

3120. MUST YOU?

MUST YOU?

This fellow I knew, the
laboring one, all fat and
bombastic and proud, now
he's posting lewd and obscene,
all in the name of his Lord : the
one with the money he worships,
with the cat-mouth and padded entrails,
the one with the secret ambitions and tales.
He lieth like Mofito. He fibs to tell a story.
This time, gone a bit too far, we've got him,
posting pictures on a poster, backed with
his own excuses, of some dark girl getting
it in her tail, from behind, from the very same
position he lives at. So fine. It's all understandable
however; trying and trying and trying.

3119. POSTING AT THE CENACLE

POSTING AT THE CENACLE

Now. One hundred things I've listed and
never have done : to be done. My life seems
a very simple salve for what it is that ails me.
I turn in place, and nothing seems amiss.
Keeping orderly things in a row is easy,
like a spouse to talk with. Putting down
the renegades and rebels, now that's
another order. They insist only on
doing what they will.