3324. REFLECTIONS ON

REFLECTIONS ON

Time was Man could see : light of

the Moon shining down through

the trees, strange shadows along a

wolfpath at night. The forest was

folded and ribbed, saddled to ride

with dimension and flourish. By the

light of the silvery Moon. Today's

standards, so much dimmer, we

lick two stamps, not even, and send

things on their way. Oh marvelous

Earth, I have married you for your

change and dimension. Or then

again have I not?

3323. 'NOT LONG ENOUGH', THE MINER SAID

'NOT LONG ENOUGH', 

THE MINER SAID

'Air grows short in a pocket; we do not know,

by the new flow, if the water will reach you, nor

if you'll stay dry. Twelve feet of solid rock

we've got to drill  -  harsh  -  and that's once

we get down there. We can't wire you for light.

We can't wire you for air. Whatever you do,

be careful down there and - I guess - just

wait. No sacrificial landing this is, and there

are a hundred faces up here crying.'

-

Then the loud dogs barked the tripwire

while those men with lanterns held their

lights. Insipid, invalued humans; there

was nothing left to do.

3322. DO YOU WISH? (the Gardener's Lament)

DO YOU WISH?

(the Gardener's Lament)

Do you wish to force the clover past the brick?

Place the newly painted planter by the portmanteau

or portecochere  -  whatever those sounds like

fussy words declare? Do you wish your hat, even

your gown, your very clothes, now to be withheld

within my gardener's hands (for I would strip you

like a stem)? And, oh yes, I can grow things, I can

press you 'til your heart upends. I can love you

easy or love you hard; your choice to sing, my 

oh-so-lovely thing. Let us mark these notes,

instead, to muse on  -  how the singular light

of daytime marks your lonesome face; how the

small bird, singing, watches wary, and - lastly - 

how this regal breeze the fir tree brushes. Now,

do you wish to force the clover past the brick?

3321. I DREAM OF THINGS

I DREAM OF THINGS

I am not that very good at running - 

hacking breath with blood, keeping

snide evasions to the side of me, watching

others pass me on the fly. And yes, yes,

correct, I dream of things  -  the day my

wings shall fly, the morn' my ship comes

in, the night my eyes shall cry and the

race that I shall win!

3320. THE PHILIP GUSTON BRIDGE

THE PHILIP GUSTON BRIDGE

nyc, (1967)

I called back once, and he was gone.

All that color and content, patiently 

waiting for him, or myself, to come.

The ceaselessly stupid old phone rang

crankily off its hook  -  no one ever

answered; just as no one ever sang or

warbled, or hummed. A hangman in a 

hood, that fat cigar, and the cracked 

and mottled shoe : loathsome intimations

of how rank this single humanity can be.

-

I shook his hand and tapped his back,

numerous times and long ago, on Eighth

Street and on Tenth. We hung together

like compadres  -  the crazy Rover 2000,

the car he drove to and fro, and his wry

smile  -  over and over  -  about something

quaint or another. Back and forth to talk.

-

Morty Feldman. The Woodstock studio,

Milton Resnick and David Hare. Jesus

Christ, I'd give an arm to have it all again.

3319. AS THOUGH THE WAITING

AS THOUGH 

THE WAITING

We take the weave, the warp, the very

natural injury of time and thread it over

substance : 'little lamb, who made thee?',

'shall I wear my trousers rolled?', 'I wander

through these charter'd streets', and all the rest

of that. Idleness bemoans itself, as a claptrap

of little minds. And, nonetheless, as though

the waiting meant something  -  as though the

very waiting in and of itself held value  -  we,

stutteringly, travel on. Unlocking morning doors,

writing that note, brewing coffee on a lacquered

ledge. Sitting back. Swerving a yellow car through

some black and muddy traffic of valueless virtue.

-

Every time to go means getting where one's going.

-

Instead, I wallow. I watch the frozen Autumn

flower droop and crack its timely Death. Yes, 

yes, the season has held its court and you are

guilty! Found to be culpable, now even you,

oh Beauty, oh Life, oh all this thrust of Goodness,

must  -  by this decree  -  go! Take leave! Die off!

3318. WHAT THEY TOO HAVE LIT

  WHAT THEY TOO HAVE LIT

To there; to fabricated men, to fractured women,

to lost moments, to meanings without thought.

I light the light and it illumines, while all my

thoughts, well-lit as well, reflect

what they too have lit.

3317. GOING TO TEXAS WITH SAM SHEPHERD

GOING TO TEXAS 

WITH SAM SHEPHERD

'Oh damn, we're already fucked up!' The little sun

was shining flat out, baking the ground and killing

all lesions. The noise behind us wasn't noise, just

sound. The cooking of beetles. The grilling of hides.

Along the horizon, only the ridiculous look of 

Mexico sheds, Alamo sides, Amarillo antics.

In a little, squat, suburban town, we pulled into

a grease-stained driveway, broken and slanted.

Somehow (and why?) a '68 Super Sport, some

ghost of an old Chevrolet, sank and rotted. We 

turned once to look, and you muttered - 'Jesus

and shit both; there she is'. Her name was Nanta

Maris Escovara, and for two hundred miles I'd

heard nothing but her story  -  a life-blood of

sex and devilment (hell, wanting even me to

jump in!), the brother who died on Yucatan 

Road, the three kids left behind. Did I

mention the sex? I really forget. We 

got out of our own limping car, and

she came over, just like that, like 

we'd just seen her yesterday and

had more to say.

3316. DICE (1099)

DICE (1099)

Shadow into seeming; dark night into Death.

The staggering leap of fire and heat, the jump

across the divide, the lime beneath the feet.

All, all, all for nothing at all. I watch the crusaders,

boot-blacks and lancers, wriggle their way past truth

and consequences. The pole that pierces someone's

heart holds not mine but another. I waltz across

the history zone, in silent, secret reverie, too tired,

as it is, to scream or flinch. Shadow into seeming;

dark night into this. The blackbird yelling, the jackdaw

dense, the Jesus of the image on the banner, now

afire, burns to dust and ashes on a brittle field of want.

(All, all, all for nothing at all).

3315. A SINGLENESS OF TIME

A SINGLENESS 

OF TIME

We are growing our bodies outside of ourselves,

relegating the present to a circumstance, and

moving on. And then - I hear a door slap shut

and realize nothing yet remember :  once too

when I was somehow a child, open and 

unshuttered, insisting on making loud noises.

Now, all things have changed. There are

voices parting ways, dissembling in a haste

of 'harvest fairs' and 'Thanksgiving plans'.

All things I never wish to see.  The chrome 

sun shines off the Buick's blue face, and

somewhere, near above, the terminal clock

chimes off another railroad hour.

3314. COMES TO THINKING

COMES TO THINKING

I have not blinked. I am still here.

Drinking wine from an ashtray, something

akin to reading Anne Sexton by the

double-dose - such it is that makes me

bleary. Dead-eyed Jack, all is black,

with two marvelous bandits on the corner.

No, I have not blinked and I am still here.

3313. OUR MEEK ADJUSTMENTS

OUR MEEK ADJUSTMENTS

By all my mutilated edges I have wholesome come to this :

my most magnificent crenelations, rudders in the brain,

ripples on the head, slow folds on the cranium of all my

time. All the wind, in turn, undulates these things like

willows blowing slow rhythms of the riverside's edging.

Squirrels and chipmunks, in the hills above, stop short

and take their notice, while filthy geese and placid ducks

don their usual pacings for whatever it is may come below.

(We make our meek adjustments to what the world may bring).

3312. HEAVEN AND HELL, JUMBLED

HEAVEN AND 

HELL, JUMBLED

I read the light coming through buildings and

doorways, coating streets and people. All the

light told me was gracious and gold. In each

entry, something huddled : once, a dun-gray

man, shivered from cold, and - in another -

a tired woman holding a cat in her arms.

Farther off, three fellows, close together,

seemed never to stop talking, in a near-rout,

jostling as they went. This was the open book,

 the street, the light-van, pooling and vibrant.

Twenty years ago, I'd never have looked

and never understood. Now, I knew the

reach of Heaven's presence, here, where

I stood. There is no greater place than

all this is; this Heaven and Hell jumbled.

3311. TREES

TREES

There wasn't a blanket for the forest,

nor a forest for the trees. Everything

was white, like a solid wall, bright. We

jangled the commingled action, screaming

all the while about things unseen. You

partied with your face off. I was the jester

to your mourning cloth. New Orleans and

then Mount Arlens  -  two such different

places and neither made a difference to

each. I called, but they all were calling back.

-

When the reivers hit the river, everything

went down. We were caught in the flood,

down in the flood, lost in the flood. We

were lost in the flood, down in the flood,

caught in the flood. My Arlington master

said I'd 'finally made the grade, in spite

of all else.' I really thanked him, and left.

-

With all of that, I was alone with...the trees.

A spangled whitewash, a jeddermaster fope

of mis-matched words, a harlequin of night's 

own fusion. I spoke to my dark shadow, and

it spoke right back, by the light of a now

gorgeous moon. I'd 'finally made the 

grade, in spite of all else.'

3310. MICHELMAS (Candy Factory)

MICHELMAS

(Candy Factory)

This Michelmas has a factor in my being.

Heralding change, the mad doctor brings

his curtain down. The sledgehammer eyes

of the weaver are doing their little job to

assess and size up the totality of limits:

those lights set twinkling in the harbor,

the two men obscurely, and yet somehow

mysteriously too, lighting each other's

cigarettes in a darkened wharfside alley.

A heartfelt Hart Crane manuever

if ever one there was.

3309. SENATOR TOWN

SENATOR TOWN

The best thing he ever did was die;

like dining on poison fish, he swallowed

and gagged and fell over. Taking all

that filthy money with him? Well, no,

not really  -  the stinking cod left it

all behind. All those corrupt lines

of payoffs and deals. All those

hands out, to Senator Ellis Town,

and not a dollar clean left to spare.

He's dead, and gone from here.

3308. OLD CHALK

OLD CHALK

The wind left bloodlines on the beachfront sand,

places where people had been dragged and

pummeled. The Inn at Old Chalk  -  or the

ruins of what once was there seventy years ago  -

were still up on the cliff. About a mile off,

to the left of there, the once-village graveyard

slumbered. The dead had played their dice

and plied their strife, long before, and, now,

it was all over and finished. The wind had

left bloodlines on the beachfront sand.

-

The people in the village, the tired ones,

the near-dead-but-not, still exclaimed

to one another about the ways things

were : 'The Bowdy boy, I watched; 

he died, there, on the beach.' Extending

a wiry, crooked finger, they flail at

pointing to something afar. 'The

lugger-boat, as I recall, had

quite nearly cut him in two.'

-

The wind grew fiery and messy;

the yellowing storm lashed and

tore. Like fire-rockets coming

from dirge and destruction,

broken pieces of another

world  -  now mangled and

torn  -  left only shreds of

a place that once was

Old Chalk Inn.

3307. TWIN-SPECIES

 TWIN-SPECIES

As if separated at birth, we are twins from a land

where no borders exist, where air is the essence

of everything and where  -  solids be damned  -

there is nothing to grasp or to handle. The

blue sky, we later realize, goes on within us.

-

If comedy could be termed a factor in what this

world is, I'd be laughing still. As it is, the only

blanket that keeps me warm is the sad blanket 

of sorrow; and we are twins, from a land

where no borders exist.

3306. EXPERIMENT

EXPERIMENT

I did all that your experiment asked of me :

I learned your art, I drank your wine, I textured

each of your long durations  -  night, day, and

whatever was in between. Each smile you sent

my way, I decorated just as you showed.

Like some eerie pumpkin's juicy mash, this

time-soaked derivative of living came my way.

I realize only now, we really should

have talked it over first.

-

That ghost from your gazebo, yes, it still

comes around seeking handouts and love;

throws its caution to the wind, prances

so like an idiot, shows itself off to

most anyone at all. My view now?

Hardly worth a bastard's effort.

-

In the last flood, all that mud washed

the evidences away  -  but I had

been there, hiding out, just to

see what a ghost does when

it's bored. Not much differently

than you and I do, it claims to

fall in love, seeks life, runs

crazy-rampant from edge

too edge. Then it tires,

and disappears.

3305. GRIEF HAS A FUTURE

GRIEF HAS A FUTURE

It is said (I've heard it said) that

grief has a future  -  with eyes you

can recognize, with a face that bears

resemblance (bears resemblance nightly

to a million things). I will write these notes,

and keep them (keep them here, by this

candlelit nook). She is crying again, and 

all those raging teardrops roll down her face.

-

In the alcove and hallway, there is a little,

dim shining, a reflection of something old,

or something new in passing. Something

passes (something passes that way, away).

It seems to be a living thing, yet flickers,

fades, and then  -  it too  -  passes.

(It too passes away).

3304. I DROVE THE SEDAN

I DROVE THE SEDAN
I drove the sedan that went right past
your mountain house, the gulch in the
gully, the wandering curve in the road.
I saw the swans on McAfee Road, and
the pond alongside Albion Hall. It was
all I could do not to stop. Simply stalled,
like that, I would have had nothing to
show for all that went before.
-
The red on the barn, I noted, had faded;
a less-intense and fiery red, a dimmer
version of the hue, the same sort of
flame a dying ember throws, a marker
cast down on a charcoal-filled earth.
I shuddered in thinking, here again,
of all the things I might have passed.

-

And then I read your words, making

me happy and sad together - how my

words made pictures in your mind,

and how emotions were awakened

that you could recognize. I loved

those words, and tried to thank

you for them though I failed.

-

I drove the sedan that went past

your mountain house - two doors,

four wheels, and all my mounting

and trying with it. Just as I passed,

in your window was a well-lit love.

3303. VINDICATOR I MUSED

VINDICATOR I MUSED

Do not allow the wise one to relish your

goods and ways - keep such thoughts at bay.

Enamored of everything else, he passes you by.

Fir trees along the Glimmerglass, James Fenimore

Cooper and his warrantless braves. Escaping

settlers, running through woods with muskets

and knives. Beneath a long-tarred and starry

sky, murderous yells and murder itself. I once

gazed down, from a gentle height, past trees

and shrubbery below, to the lakefront itself.

A fire beckoned, and three or four men huddled.

Whatever tongue they were speaking, I did not

understand. Yet, I knew they were ruthless

men and would kill me if they could. I was born

here, 'neath the reedy place, by the brook, beneath

the Spirit's canopy of light. Now, all things were

in jeopardy, myself included. I lived, only if they

died. I thought of a future, realizing there could

be none at all. Sweeping down, silently at first,

then with a scream, I cleanly killed

and gutted the them all.

3302. THE BEARDING OF NIPPLES

THE BEARDING 

OF NIPPLES

The bearding of nipples on the great

divine chest has been replaced by

obligation and noblesse. I do not

know  -  but think I can recognize

the genuflect of fear and awe by

which Man is harnessed : a 

something amiss that will always

show. To that I can testify and

witness, and will do so.

-

Such error is an invisible charge

which draws out the joy from life -

small, insignificant segment, iota

of semblance, sanctified sadness

of sentence, whatever.

-

In spite of solace and shame, the

even-yellow sun goes on, and

we are as lost in its circle and orb

as ever before  -   not knowing

where to turn but turning, not

knowing what for. 

-

Doubts and triumphs together:

I walk out with them, and

somehow leave alone.

3301. MERCHANDISE MART

MERCHANDISE MART
I hated your mother and never fathomed your
father. The Ides of March, like some delectable
yet stinking disease, kept my crapmouth from
hedging every bet. As I recall, she wore gold
on every other finger, while he wore chains
around his neck. It was never right, and,
as I thought it over just today, I still could
not understand why we even lived to try :
some linen on the back of a chair, a table,
topped by glass, holding some ceramic
figurines and a cup of steaming coffee.
An old piece of mail, with a very
foreign stamp. Two pictures of
a man from Africa.
-
Safari suit and dead-letter office, Nairobi
Kenya and a fountain pen blotch; stroked
feathers while whistlers waited, and the
fan-light in the old bushman's depot.
He'd taken us there, to show off and
buy lunch. I remember that photo.
Nothing ever worked out.
-
He too was dead, a single poison dart
entering his heart; along the beach.
Jim Rattigan, killed from some
jungle-tree ambush far, far
from home.

3300. AMENDED AND VARIANT

AMENDED AND VARIANT

You've made me disappear - stiletto and sabre,

all those things passed from lethargy to slavery

and back. Reflected globes are shimmering in the

water, on surfaces where they should not be.

So many things, rejected, seem still to be around.

Solace, like a pancake, flattens and distorts the

angles. We wash the air with a teary dirge.

-

It was ice cream. It was the night. Kinglets sang;

narrow drawers held hundreds of the little birds.

Festering, from tree to tree, bad vibrations rang,

motions without merit, dangling items left for

play. A thin flashlight line, and a bead of some

illumined moment, again made me think of you.

I reached for nothing, and it was there.

-

All along the spider's web, the masses in the

street kept marching; screaming they were,

all together, like morons, as one about something:

Hustled and hassled, huddled and huge.

I never understood a thing except my own

needs - for silence, detachment,

disconnection and dreaming.

3299. FAST SETTING AND MIRACULOUS

FAST SETTING 

AND MIRACULOUS

Skyfall. I was the one running. The new

crescent moon hung angled in the sky.

Twilight. Midnight. Morning. Like nothing

ever moved at all. I truncated the rebels

at the old border's edge. Rousted them

with ricochet and raiment, ran their

footsores loosely through the gamut.

Trumpets blared and a parrot sang.

Valley Forge and Maple Gorge, the lasses

in the violet sky were singing. No one bent

the dirges or bowed to dawn's early light.

Every blessed thing was every blessed thing.

-

The scourpath beguiled; all the marshalls

and a major stopped and gaped while

horses whinnied, slept and yawned.

That's just the way it went back then,

in that - older - revolution. Years later,

lifetime achievements and medals of honor

never meant as much; never. And now,

all the old ones, they're gathered on the

hilltop singing songs, dirges to what occurred

and hopeful scats to the newest of volcanoes.

3298. WHO RUES MELCHISIDEK? (I was walking with this God)

WHO RUES

MELCHISEDEK?

(I was walking with this God)

The white pants and the rain God,

all those magnificent things parading

down. 'I am King of Gods, mistaken

notion, keeper of ideal flames.' Spoken

like a boast, I could only think of

Patty Miles. 'But you are not, sir,

and all, all of this, is mistaken. So

let me take this peasant pomp you

proffer and run away with it, right

through your nose, in fact.'

-

And just then, right along Girard Ave.,

the Philadelphia streetcar clanged and

rattled. Some ten black fats got off

as one - 'You are, myself, I see, one

of these. Are you not, then?' He tried

taking my hand; he said 'Let us be off

now, and to the kennels. Let us buy

ourselves a dog!' Approbation.

Infatuation. Circulation.

-

Just below the street-level fence, cut

out from where I was, I saw the rails of

the old cemetery graveyard fence jutting

out - all those dead and quiet people,

oh all those dead and quiet people.

3297. EPITAPH

EPITAPH

His odd life agreed with him.

He developed piles and scurvy;

lost patches of hair, and  -  finally  -

a few teeth, before he somehow

sweated to death while freezing.

3296. LAYOUT

LAYOUT

This garb is what we wear, the blue frothy
coat, the red buttons, the lame glimmer-scarf
and the hat. On stage, it comes out very colorful
after they first tint the lights. The way they
want them. The way I never see. The way
it's been. It's hard looking out when
you're outside looking in.
-
Some then call me distant, others call me
gay, while others simply say 'weird wide
and on the way.' I take it all; as if on a Hallmark
Hallmark card from Hell, I can read the funny
lines and cry no matter. Shake my hand,
God-damn, and it comes off in yours.
Your joke will be my loss.
-
And now, for the ten-millionth-hundredth time,
the same old raging bastards are calling it
Halloween. Pagan-festive-fire-fest, soldiers
of the dim and dark dance naked 'round
oil-barrel fires at Washington and 12th.
Yes, yes, I was there for many. And the
Wolfman turning back and forth again:
wolf, man, man, wolf, wolf, man, man, wolf.
-
We never got drunk beneath the broad, full moon.

3295. DAY OF THE LOCUST

DAY OF THE LOCUST
On the day of the locust I was in
Brooklyn, waiting my turn at
Grimaldi's; watching the bridge
throw its harbor-fleet shadows
now over nothing at all. Tonnage
and cargo, long gone, had absconded
to regions that only the netherworld
knew. A maritime flag on the outpost
wharf? It simply signified yet
another place to wine and dine.
-
A hundred faces paced the walk -
those strange tattooed artists and
their bedfellow girls, those pierced
and dainty females all done up for
voyeuristic sex and the ribald
entertainments of Lebanese
sharks. Why am I waiting,
here at Grimaldi's, for
really nothing at all?
-
Everything is accidental,
and sharpshooters run
rampant all along the
shoddy rooflines.

3294. SURETY AND A NOTION

SURETY AND A NOTION
All these terrible days, and then you're

going to tell me I have to die? I don't
believe this. Like the windward willow
bending to the lake, dreary to droop
but staying in place, I withstand every
urge to flee. And I will do so too. I will
not die. You can mark my words, even
after I'm dead and gone.

3293. DRIVING HOME THE POINT

DRIVING HOME THE POINT

(my Mexican Chef)
They bat for average, and I'm dizzy as hell.
Can't stand straight. Whole world spins.
No way is that to pin the tail on the donkey.
Right, amigo. Go for broke, both you and
your little senorita there. Drive that Taurus
until it dies, runs out of gas or burns. Tar
the roof all day, spin, weave, flip - food,
pizza or gas. Whatever it is you do for dough.
Money I mean; the American stuff. All the
points along the border are pointing to here.
Are they not, Carlos Mendicimo Armagandos
Perez Aguirre? I think that was the name on
you tag. Brewmaster. Soup-chef.

3292. JUST OUT OF PETERSBURG

JUST OUT OF PETERSBURG
My mind recalls a hundred things.
My mind is filled with a million thoughts,
and I remember a few as well - each vivid
but 'just passing through', as the 'so-to-say'
crowd would utter. Why am I facing the
Gulf of Finland, just looking out from some
Petersburg scat - a paranormal fog, a
slithery eel of creeping light that now,
alone itself, barely illumines this
cavernous station for trains, which,
in themselves, seem as reluctant
to move as I do? The language
I am hearing is itself struggle
enough to listen to.
-
In my own country, we have small
music halls, auditoriums, as it were,
where people sit to listen. People,
filled with salt and sugar, nod and
bob to what the sounds direct
them. Not here - enormous
patchulated music halls
infringe on space and time,
forcing vast musics on all
those open and unaltering
musical ears.
-
Well, it is said, there is little
difference anyway. Perhaps.
But I have come by train to
this far and barely electric
place to take my spot behind
a bass. And here I am, now
silent - or just as silent as
History is - without a real
story to tell, yet filled with
thoughts and lore and tales,
looking out towards the
Gulf of Finland.

3291. NEUKIRK TO OSTERGAARD

NEWKIRK TO OSTERGAARD
While not knowing anything, all the known
world - nonetheless - drops at your
feet. Can you recognize such feasance,
understand the noise? The streamlining
of a bird, ancient as it is, is but idle banter
in the hands of a greater Maker. All time
ticks to this imagined tune, and every
ancient mariner knows these tales :
the bright star, set on high, the
the lethal barriers found at the
very edge of the world, the end
of all things, just around
that seaward curve.

3290. LEARNING YOUR TONGUE

LEARNING YOUR TONGUE
I dug your language at Vladivostok.
Getting too close to Korea, I started
to fear. All that Trans-Siberian
Railroad stuff kept me in stitches:
that stern Russian tongue, those
beautiful girls stiffing their lips
to curl at their nose just to say
'If you are from another land,
if you would love me, I could
make you very happy if you
would take me away.' Anyway
that's how I translated it - the train
guide said I was close, but also 'they
are really eastern whores dressing
right here for your silent masquerade.'

3289. RECITAL AT GROVES

RECITAL AT GROVE
We take these things for granted:
the blood-red heart, the feelings
it throws. High above, some jewel-blue
sky tries echoing back all that we feel.
The jet-plane zones off, its race to
altitude now hardly worth the humming.
Tired days, these are, when the roar
and cacophony of our own intentions
spills. We stop at nothing. We go to France.
-
Your milk-money, I'd noticed, was still
pinned to your dress. No way to travel,
honey. In each of those dangerous lands
you speak of you'd be a sitting duck. Why
I myself, were I there, might lunge to
get you, take you, steal your goods
and money. It's just like that, doesn't
really mean a thing. We are traveling
people, our generations switch roles.
-
I'd much rather stay behind, now that
I think it over, and sing of happy fields
and wandered pastures, coves and
hamlets where I'd been to before.
This recital at Grove, this reverie,
would be my own personal moment
of true joy and happiness.

3288. OMAHA THEATER

OMAHA THEATER
They were still holding the
branding irons in their
tumultuous hands; iron men,
fellows with sizzling arms.
The stench was awful - a
foul reek of burned flesh
punctuated by the calls
and groans of the anguished
animals. A cruel fest, a fight
by fire to name the herd
and brand the beast.
Callow-hearted fellows,
to say the least, just
stood around, laughing.

3287. THE CIVIL WAR

THE CIVIL WAR
Wheeze forth great nation dead and
bloodied, power has now left your hands.
The willow trees escape, there is smoke
and fire o'er the land. And for how long have
you really wanted this? Let us count.
-
The dead are in their sepulchres. They
sound alike their meanings all - the
Civil War graveyard of Elmira's bare
middle, all stories and columns and
words. The smoking guns, crossed,
atop what passes for a Union flag.
-
I haven't yet left before I've yet
arrived, and these beating memories
resound like flame and sorcery
in small boys' eyes. It is over!
It is over! My God, my God,
why have you forsaken me?

3286. MY AMNESTY

MY AMNESTY

To let you go? To fire up that silly
stove again? To singe the butter

on the rafters, make the rye bread
squirm? Whatever are you talking of?
I hadn't heard the headmaster before,
merging manners with the queen of
something else, the measure of the
mattered hand, the Matterhorn of
Marmaduke. It's all like unreality,
now itself so real. Make that twice
over, and once again. I drink to that.
-
The page-boy look, once wasted on the
young, has climbed its ladders to the distant
stars. Babel to Baba-Lou. Gravestone
side-steppers to the gabled mansions of
Erewhon and Potupoi - I have them
all, and they've stopped my minding.
-
Now, it's only you.

3285. LOOSELAND LOOSESTRIFE

LOOSELAND LOOSESTRIFE
These gardeners I see holding shovels
and sticks, they are talking amongst
one another. They stand on grass -
it would seem - more than principal.
-
And now it begins to drizzle again.
From where they are standing, more
annoyance than fact. The rain
puts their cigarettes out.

3284. WARFARE, PESTILENCE, AND GREETINGS

WARFARE, PESTILENCE,
AND GREETINGS

Standing towards the end of my life I'd swear to
see you - dunking lightbulbs, or swishing girders gladly
in the old and open Delaware Canal. Where we may have
passed as strangers, where we may have lived together.
I don't know. My dirigible sensations are gone, these
tired fingers rankle now with only dead pages, and -
all else together - I too await the ferryman to take me.
'You were born to live, my boy, as much as you were
born to die. Fear not the ferryman, he will always come by.
It's just a matter of time : warfare, pestilence, and greetings.'
-
I held you close, once, as a little girl. We shared time together.
Then, older and later, we moved along the same towpath,
it seemed, until even the donkeys and mules collapsed.
If they could talk, I knew they would have said 'this
pulling barges is just no fun.' But I was in another
world, and lived between the times. The meadows,
being once meadows, always fit me fine. Now, it
seems they're paved with discontent. Yours is
yours, and mine is mine. It's all just a matter
of time : warfare, pestilence, and greetings.

3283. MODELING FOR PRESS AGENTS

MODELING FOR
PRESS AGENTS
Just like Modigliani, or one of his
things, we drive for respect in
oh so languid poses. Half-draped,
half-not; watching the clock to
see what transpires. Everything
we do is done for effect, after,
of course, cause. Twilight dims
the rim of time, as we sit,
so lazily about.

3282. AND SUCH A GLIMMERING WILD ONE

AND SUCH A GLIMMERING WILD ONE
We used to hang at street-corners, leaning on stone,
skipping a beat, watching glass and water : no, no,
we never stopped. The hard-angled zoo we inhabited
with cigarettes and wine, poppers and spikes, all of
that we knew like no others. Leather-girls in their
toney skirts, and not. Hookers at Stage 9, playing
dead-dice with the boys. Wonton chefs, singing
weird Chinese songs. I never knew collaboration
to taste so good. It was a long, long time ago.
-
And just now you used a name I had not heard
since 1974 and before. I do remember him,
precisely, and even where his body stays.
Some nasty crypt near Bedloe's Island,
some Potter's Field, or one of those.
Those were East River days: they
took his lifeless body over on a skiff,
and soon came back without him.
-
We once pumped the monkey full
of juice, ate the girl before she came,
wired down the torchlights for the
approaching storm. Now, Jesus lord
almighty, it's all so over and gone.
Distant memory, afar, like an
iron taste on a bitter tongue.

3281. POST-APOCALYPTIC VENISON

POST-APOCALYPTIC
VENISON

Everyone who could
had already died.

3280. WHAT WAS SCHEDULED ONCE IS NOT WRITTEN TWICE

WHAT WAS SCHEDULED ONCE
IS NOT WRITTEN TWICE

Bleistein with a Baedeker, remember that one? Or anyway, I
think I've gotten it right - he held two fingers aloft, and judged
accordingly, laughed at the moon once, and walked on. Just
today, returning from some stupid romance, I watched the
calendar sky disappear: it passed right through my ages,
and left me thinking of nothing at all. Not the way of all
Mankind, exactly, but it would have to do.
-
Standing alongside the moon-faced pie girl, I watched
the building come down. Piece by piece now, they were
ripping at its facade. Two-hundred year old brick, simply
turning - under pressure - to an orange powder.
The noise glass makes, over and over, and then
the steel of the window-frames hitting ground.
Park-dirt this was not, nor did it seem exactly
even proper to do demolition in this way.
-
Who knew what I don't know? This cloth-fed
engineer, the Greek with the clipboard veneer,
walking around looking at things as they
happened? Was he the one with all the plans?
Sacred or not, as it happened, one old church,
lane-split, and a housing unit or two, all
chunked together. 'To whom are you
reporting now?' I wanted to ask. But
my tumbled tongue was caked with
dust. The moon-faced girl near to
me, she smiled and just took my
hand to lead me away.
So I followed.

3279. ANGELS

ANGELS
I'm surely not one to be wrestling
with Gods and the beatific window
dressings I see: five angels clutching
beads, a running man with a fiery
halo, an infant holding things down.
This fortuitous moment itself
knows nothing; runs aside,
tries to glide. Let's put our heads
together, let's sing and praise -
your multi-colored straw bag,
your orange-painted nails,
your sandals and your Snapple.
My God, my God, we have
come to this!
-
Not an occasion for malice, this
watching the sunlight grow,
opening up the nighttime skies
wherein I have been walking
for hours - endless hours that
were not from here. And, yes,
still I know what I see; and they
have dropped me here with
their extended, small wings.
-
Which wings are but concept,
anyway, idea. Like the thought
of how much blue is in that black.
Beatific angels, I ask you. The
light is now playing on the bricks,
and this faulty city is all I see.
Oh in such pain I cry out to you,
please, please, please
listen now to me.

3278. KNOXVILLE SHAKEOUT

KNOXVILLE SHAKEOUT
My Knoxville shakeout came like this:
plane wings down, hit the tarmac,
grab a bag and walk the ellipse. Tuba
player and sing-shift clarinetist both
along for the ride. Observe the stage,
survive the ride. At half past seven,
(yeah, they'd written it all out), the
music was to begin. Stride forth
like some piano man surely
breaking wind.
-
The crowd was along in pairs,
two by fours and tuxedo junctions.
Sitting to stare, small cocktails
in smaller glasses, half dead or
half awake it wouldn't have really
mattered. Why we played on,
to the stroke of one, I'll
never really understand.
-
Got paid in Rue Diablos, some
Devil-money shaped like squares.
I knew this was over before it
started; 'Joe! There's the
plane, get up those stairs!'

3277. A SIMPLE SETTLEMENT

A SIMPLE SETTLEMENT
I've always hated all that
retro stuff, and those who
side with matter gone -
I've had my Marilyn on
the halfshell while my
stomach groaned and
burned. 'Write quickly,'
the matador said, 'for
Venus de Milo is
arriving soon.'

3276. MY MEXICAN ELLIPSE

MY MEXICAN ELLIPSE
Luck brings this morning passing
strange, a break I'd not foreseen -
the girl with cornrow hair now
whistling some turgid tune.
Each synapse I own declares:
'Race this moment to its finish,
and you are nothing if
not what you seem.'

3275. THE DOGS OF WAR

THE DOGS OF WAR
When sometimes the dogs of war
are snarling, and rabid, tug their
leashes, then the foiling sun with
great reluctance deems it best
to set. All things darken by degree,
and shades and shadows redefine
the lines and shapes of all we see -
how fraught with trepidation,
new, all things are.
-
Might I, then, say this backwards?
Recite some ode of Horace in reverse,
faulting ends and enemies, turning
'round the battles and the fight?
No, I seek the straighter line,
where things, still in rows, hold
tight to all their marks and meanings.

3274. THIS LIFE JUST A TRAGIC ATTRACTION

'THIS LIFE JUST A
TRAGIC ATTRACTION'

'Receding water exposes bodies,
0r at least we expect,' the man said.
His cigarette dangled from pursed, fussy
lips and I fully expected him to gag.
Something there was about this fellow -
made strange by circumstance - brought
me to disbelief. Badge and gun notwithstanding,
if he was the Law, I wanted to be an outsider, now.
-
He'd said his loyalty was to the Law and that
upholding it had become his life's work. 'Yeah,
sure' I thought. I wished I had a five-hundred
dollar bill to dangle in his face - just to see
what he'd do for money. If he knew the Law,
then I knew all about Charley Chase.
-
I watched the back of his head as he
stood there, and I realized right then
that the piece of plastic I saw was actually
the back edge of his wig - toupee, hairpiece,
whatever. Yes, I wanted to laugh, but was
sure it wouldn't be wise. Other than that,
it looked pretty real, or at least I never
had noticed before. Good enough for me.
-
'I admonish you, if you're at all squeamish,
to look away. As we drag these bodies up
it's apt to get ugly.' I knew what he meant,
but I knew just as well it was bullshit - I'd
heard him and his cronies beforehand, talking
of women's bodies and things they had seen.
-
I guess it's like that everywhere - the lark runs the rush,
the beaver breaks the dam, things eventually do
just run out of control. No more stops, and no
one to stop it. This Life, just a tragic attraction.
This life, just a tragic attraction.

3273. WALKING ON THE MOONLIGHT NOT IN IT

WALKING ON THE
MOONLIGHT NOT IN IT

This is the circumstance : what one man wants
is what another avoids. Crystal bright and as
clear as glass, the fir trees seem to stand still
as light from the moon comes to them. I walk
between things, two worlds apart; neither in
nor of the place I am. Strange, how that
silent singularity marks a life.
-
I was raised in a place of wolves; red men
doing white things, white men falling back.
Beneath five hundred skies, I traveled
with wings of gauze 'midst azure skies.
The rocks and stones beneath me,
they each called out my name.
-
Epochs of time and eons of purpose.
I waltzed hills and valleys, danced
voluble dinosaur steps, ran fiery
sabre-toothed tigers in my racing.
My days were numbered and caught
by starlight and solar flares, brilliant
moments of flash and glory.

3272. MASKED MAN FIGHTING THE OASIS

MASKED MAN
FIGHTING THE OASIS
They still go on with that settled manner
of pioneers cutting through Iowa - and
even though it's all rubbish, they thrive.
Their dream-mud-hut-cabin is built of
reeds and sticks, sloppy slag-heap stone
with foundations of Indian blood. I
don't know why we read the book and
read it over and over again. See the
flag, yellow and blue, they insist flying.
-
Battering the betterments of batallions
of women and men : offspring decrepit,
those children of wanderers fall at the
wayside screaming out names. Everything
has fallen and all bridges are down. The
last man standing shall not make a sound.
-
This is like a nightmare now :
some Kiowa County Sheriff
beating to death the protesters
outside the old steel-mill. Union
men who blush for daggers and
fornicate until they drop. No cares
like the old cares - everything
else just fades away.

3271. BLUE BOTTLE OF VODKA

BLUE BOTTLE OF VODKA
I found an empty blue bottle 'American made'
vodka, branded by fellows and drunk by a
crew. They'd left it, as an empty, telling
stories all its own on a tidy window ledge.
And oh, those potato eaters, potato drinkers,
what have you : those tales they could weave.
Stories of evil and dogs, mothers with donkeys
and hens. Fathers with cleavers and friends.
-
'Nothing like this had ever occurred before' -
all tawdry bullshit too and they knew it so.
'My fine fellows', I uttered in imagination,
'everything has already happened, and
happened before and already. And I'm
not even drunk with your peppered
elixir.' We all left it at that, and they
stammered away. I've got their
blue bottle, now, in my hands.

3270. JESUS JALOPY JONES

JESUS JALOPY JONES

As it was once there was a man
with cinderblocks, building walls and
painting them red, washing the white wash
down to its essence, facing the cinder with
golden paint. He was making kingdoms for

children and markers for Man. He came

upon a Saturday, dealing cards and dicing
the doubles, calling things wild, and
lining the tables with magical felt.
-
I bowed down, just once, to see if
he reacted. Nothing came from the
face but a very odd light. He seemed
more obscure than was usual. I parsed
a sentence to see his reaction. 'My single
noun to your active verb' was all he said.
-
There is no purpose in lighting the light
where no shadows go. Everything is
plainly seen, and no things
are obscured.

3269. JAMES BOGARDUS

JAMES BOGARDUS

Cooked his goose, ate the
failure, flayed the savage
item, spoiled the mare.
-
His wife Lucinda, drove
the forces home, swept
the backways freely, and
with all intentions to riot,
clowned around for all
to see.
-
James Bogardus, building
lithesome tales, renting
business tuxedos, building
bridges, lining the streets,
shook his jacket clean and
slowly began to walk
towards home.

3268. THIS HAGGARD MIND

THIS HAGGARD MIND

I just about send my post before it
so soon comes back to me : the recipient,
long gone, left nothing behind. No matter.
There are now so many voids where others
used to be that I can no longer stand. It
seems, as well, that I am last and alone.
If I were six foot four I'd have something
to crow about; as it is, midget-mitres this
side of small take my measure. Laughing.
God, I awake and realize once again -
I really do hate myself; this mawkish
body, this swiney soul, decrepit face,
haggard mind. I've shouldered so
many losing burdens that my
mind now races to its end.
Disengage this mediocre
world from me, and cut,
please, this tethered
noose and
let it fly.

3267. THIS ISN'T MY HORN

THIS ISN'T MY HORN

Things are slow in tempest town.
Though I blow the clarion call, this is
not my horn - trumpet, coronet,
alto sax, whatever it is you wish, they
all can be heard in varied increments
trebling your dive and filling your wants.
Tuba or tremelo, basso and brass. I
never really know to tell. The marks
the strange drummer has made on
the skins of his suit seem enough to
drive along this bastard rhythm.
-
Mayhem seems a dog-faced catcher
hereabouts. The landsman sits at
attention, never even varying his
shades - and the shape of his eyes,
those little, sickening slits, can
everyday make me cringe.
-
Jazz times jazz, the nickel man
declaims : 'break that meter, brother,
break it; make that rhythm soar anew!'

3266. TRANSLATION

TRANSLATION
We've left the fort together,
Hiram - you with your bells,
and me with my hammers.
The Russian tongue has a
word for such confusion :
'marushki'. We translate
it here as 'little ants'.

3265. THOUGHTS

THOUGHTS
I am being sized up by things I
do not know - the midnight Sadducees
are writing things down. Dragging
slow feet across my dangerous lane,
I try to leave no marks. But the
children, the children, are dancing
in all the streets. I look at this
tree as it splits in two - like
a thought with two sides,
railing this way and that.

3264. FOUND PAJAMAS

FOUND PAJAMAS

Jesus found pajamas.
Jesus died for those
sins of others - in
a form of spiteful
retribution, the
tale says, he
came, and
he accepted,
and, then,
he died.

3263. LONG GREEN LEGGINGS

LONG GREEN LEGGINGS

You know how you lose something, you
know how you feel? I feel that. I have lost
everything in one place : the yellow ideas
of desert and sun, the wash of the open sea,
rolling back in. Right here, I have nothing left.
Characteristically, I am shamed to say; I turn
about, wistfully regretting the time already spent.
Behind my back, the MacReady Vapors already
exhale - mist and fog down low, hanging from
Bentley Creek to Waverly Glen. Unlike the mist,
I'm all of a mind to disappear, and take
the vast world with me.
-
A new version of a Halloween stoops, drops
down before me, as a ghost in whitened leggings.
I recognize the form, yes, but cannot place the face.
Ghouls and foul curmudgeons, ghosts and spirits
rank, each of them rue me with their noises;
a crescendo of instruments now playing
from Hell, from a place where I am
baffled still and found without a
knowledge, knowing nothing.
-
Before me rises a tall green house; old and
dilapidated, said haunted, running on
nothing but fury and stealth. It has its
own darkness, room to room and
light to light. And that is where
I dwell. Third floor up, at the
top, where that blackening
light now tries to shine.

3262. 1974

1974

And now I have left you I have led you I have
left you I have led you : again and again as a
marksman hits his target once after another
and more. The chickens are dead in the yard.
The old, fevered burro you left me has finally
now expired - his last strange noise still
echoing in my frightened ears. I only wonder
to myself why you first led me here and then
left. Led me left me. Oh I am so confused.
-
I have a nickel magnet I intended for you to
have; now I'll keep it for myself. It holds the
metal in my ears, keeps the singing tribes
from leaving, lets me recall those Bond Street
days when, yes, we, the two, stayed close and
together as a whip does with its snap.
-
I am empty now. I can't recall an earthly thing,
only that stuff of other natures we once together
lived. The domino castle at the top of the fjord,
the lancer who kept his famed redoubt a secret,
the woman I knew from McIver's other farm.
-
I'm watching the fire land onto the lake.
Nothing moves. I will sleep; thinking of
your picture - you, on the curb, with
no shoes, only laughter and mirth.

3261. ELECTRIC MAGNET WAYS

ELECTRIC MAGNET WAYS

No solace in sundry words ten thousand smaller
things than that - miniature cars fallen into
the lake, vintage speeders hanging from trees.
The jackal-man who kills babies is wandering
aimless afoot. He sings of a Madonna with
her harmless Jesus, deflated by time.
-
It isn't only in the majesty of myth that
so many things get colored. The stories
tend to twist and turn, end up short,
revolve back upon themselves. We
look for Gods and guidance in the stars,
and, though there really are none, we
claim those stars and planets as the
guidelines to our crazy cosmic life.
-
Where once the past beseeched us,
now it only leads us on. No solace
in sundry words.

3260. AMULET

AMULET

The river ran its way along a
ridge of sunken rock; cold petals
and frigid air. A willow, bent like a
savage intent on ravage, dropped
its weeping sorrow into a glowing
surface of what appeared to be glass.

3259. THE SONG OF ALFRED MINER

THE SONG OF ALFRED MINER

In my ways of desperate means I have tried

so many things : filled cartfuls of despair
with outlaw angel wings. To both sides of
me, in little ways, others have tried their

infusions, theirs aids. No avail. I have stood,
both steadfast and alone. Those strangled
doors of perception have long ago faded,
a laughable crew, an ample petard. Now,
what passes for my soap is but a cleansing
skull. I leave little behind. I move, crablike,
sideways past rubble and trash; letters
left hanging, dreams that have crashed.
My tent is pitched in graveyards,
all I see is past.

3258. BEDLAM

BEDLAM
(Mr. Windemar please tell me more)
Amidst this crazy cavalcade, I landed in
Bedlam; seeking a satisfaction never there,
like a cigarette lamp burning both ends,
like a stoplight rose already wilted,
the kind the beggars sell. I punched
the clock, I beat the cop, I incarcerated
five million, Khmer Rouge, Pol Pot.
Everything gone nuts, crazy on the
edge, shallow on the waterfall, trimming
on the hedge. Those five girls I saw,
they wallowed in the mire swallowing
for hire. And, in so many other ways,
everything I once imagined I saw in
the flesh, and for real. (Sit me down
a this table, Mr. Windemar,
please tell me more).

3257. 5TH PART OF THE MOON

5TH PART OF THE MOON
(don't discount the Newman Gate)
Throw nothing my way : all things
proving to be broken lie asunder.
The 5th part of the moon I am
watching - with most interest
now settled on the light. I sense
my skin might bubble, might
bulge, food for insects and
worms - in whatever varying
degree, even that I would accept.
-
I know that I have been here before,
and am right now, yet today's seeming
aplomb being broken, nothing now
really seems to matter. Would that
my flesh would melt and I would
fly away, both artless and free.
-
There is nothing here of solace,
neither a smoothed nor a forced
to be had. Already what one has,
one possesses - we are in a creative
mode, always, making what we will
as thought and image flee. Look around.
Before things depart, they first will stay,
(don't discount the Newman Gate), and
they will be. Your false time (itself) is a
nervous tannery, absorbing - for now -
all things. Your greater mind
knows, patterns repeat.

3256. DISINCLINATION TO WORRY

DISINCLINATION TO WORRY
Let's see what we've got with this one last
admission : creamsicle iceberg wandering forth.
I never sensed the admonition true;
I only came here for the weather, and
now even that is gone. Beggarly myopic,
rehashing all tradition, I went to sleep
at the microphone stand. The sense of
endings brings forth the life (yes, yes),
and all things become the adventure.
-
The red line enters my new life, as
the blue sky stretches and I am witness
to a hundred new things. The hawk soars
as the hawk flies - carrying with it the end
of the blue, the expanse of sky, the internal
logic to every exterior motive gone into the
making of all this world and all this
(teeming, so) consciousness now.
-
(All things have become the adventure).
I have a disinclination to worry.

3255. ENAMEL SHELLAC

ENAMEL SHELLAC

Or I don't know; the difference, the shine,
the sheen, the finish. Some vegetable matter,
some chemical sludge. Whatever is mirrored
becomes the sign of the shine - and all that
finish then goes for naught. I never knew
what any of it mattered, and don't now,
for sure. I go and just look away.
-
Jim McCracken told me once that 'the beauty
of the glimmer comes from a well-rubbed
finish, and the better it's rubbed the more
it glows. That's what people most react
to.' Like he knows? Like me? I went,
and just looked away.
-
All that work, and no opinion, really.
It never matters to me; just can't
worked up like the others all do.
Beauty and shine. Quality too -
the only thing it adds up to is
price. Higher by a few,
more expensive too,
and then all those
wanting people
just want
more.

3254. DON'T THINK OF YOURSELF AS PART OF THE COWLING

DON'T THINK OF YOURSELF
AS PART OF THE COWLING
(such a little place indeed)
Adagio this, adagio that -
it seems ten things at once
demand their certain forms
of modest attraction. How many
need you select? I can stand at
attention for nothing, you understand,
(and your head was on your hat,
now how backwards was that)?
-
If lethargy had a song, you would
be it. Instead, it swoons. I hear the
cropper come undone, the long bird's
sobriquet on such a cylindrical theme
as this. I find myself repeating and
misspelling, both single things double
at the very same time. Perhaps only
the morning will save me. Hold my
hand one more time, be a
companion, dear, for life.
-
I do awake as the sky comes open;
I read my mind in the stars. All
this! All this! And such a
little place indeed.

3253. MAKER OF ROADS

MAKER OF ROADS
And things I've forgotten : lost lamps
in the dark and crossed paths after
midnight. He who covets less, covets
most. The man who breaks the plow
builds the roads, gets to see around
the bends, to peer over the tops of
hills, gets farther along, to see the
end of things : father-preacher,
lost-land maniac, blind Teresias
himself extending hands to calm
the sea, crossing the horizon with
intensity. Long lost bags of kroners
and gold; everything alike should be
such a mess, in such a dark'ling
moment as this.
-
I was born where no one should have
been - seawall, Kill Van Kull, tugs and
tankers, splashing ripples salt-wall froth.
As a small, new fly, just out of its break,
I strolled, ambled, and learned to fly -
straight enough, I guess, to hold me.
Behind my back, the squat four-story
housing projects before my face. The
waterfront amusement park,
Staten Island's grimy face.
-
My own taste...Bayonne's funny-fraught
trace, the solid bridge above my head,
aslant my manner, black with cars,
and all going nowhere in a skid - one
steel, silver moment slivered in
successful time. A promise, for some,
that the 'rock of the world
was founded securely
on a faery's wing' -
as Jay Gatz once
had said.

3252. OF ALL THINGS THAT DO NOT EXIST

OF ALL THINGS
THAT DO NOT EXIST
I only know this world the best; that on/off
fluctuation I take part in, the alternating
vague certainty you see. On/off, only/alone,
all one thing to be. I am so sure that matter
projects and through it all projecting we make
other worlds, just as we use them and they
use us. All things conjoin, all myths converge.
We are them, and they are us : owl-light,
candle-flicker, open heart ablaze - the
mirth and factor of a thousand open worlds,
each wide, all agape, and taking as they give.
On/off, and taken, as well, to give. We are
all in some sense kin, pealing back and peeling -
an 'I know you as you know me he she' sensation.
One place of many minds in an all-adjacent Time.
Yes then go. Assume the categories projected.
Round globe and definition : line chart angle heart,
the fractured songstress, the mathematics of a
Sun agreed to - solar wind and micro marsh,
all we say, what we say, and - lastly - as we last.
Enough! Nothing exists at all! One and a thousand
midnights live in such expansive darkness. The
harbor holds its boats and they depart, as too the
mind creates its mental thoughts - all probable
worlds comporting. They too take form and turn
and mire, and then depart. All that is, until
Oneness takes it away.

3251. AT READING PEAK

AT READING PEAK

I may have overstayed the waiting, slicing my back too far

down the marble slab I slept upon : awaiting a deliverance,

seeking a new sky, watching those midnight heavens for the

sight of your shooting star. Had it come, oh, oh, how I would

have known. As it was, in a form of still and desperate silence,

nothing occurred at all; and I waited still, and waited more.

-

I had known the vigil, had known the wake. I'd attended

these things, and even stayed - late, past prime, far deeper

into the night than I should have. For my being, it was all

Experience, that one, with the capital E. I singed my face

looking too deeply in. I scuttled and scoured too many

things - Rumi to Tagore and back again. No, no yes. No.

-

My marvelous reaction to things : Negation, with its

capital N. The tower on Reading's hill, some soulful

minaret, a pagoda, a temple, something narrow past

working. The old gravel road, a test grounds for

Duryea cars, a quarry from a time, long, long ago.

Now, little matters, and there is no rhyme.

These are ugly years, very weathered,

and, I sense, not mine.

3250. CINDER

 CINDER

How well-known all I've wanted, how little-known

all I've got. The charred-scared cinder I kick down

the street knows more about burning than I about

heat. And, next to that, how 'powerless I' walks about

still is a wonder. Blue sky, red and setting sun. I

looked homeward angel, but to realize there is none.

3249. SPELL MY DOOM MADAME SOON

SPELL MY DOOM
MADAME SOON
This much I can say : the moon was
in its lesser orbit and was gone from
swain. I had just dropped down the
letter and put down that book, some
older marvel, Mark Twain, Tom Paine;
neither of them makes much of a
difference now. A new thin light from
a shallow horizon tries breaking through
its memory as I am seen moving from
my home town. I majored, once, in
domestication,and my face was
a frown and the laughing sky
dangled itself before me.
-
This much I can see : the gun matter
mattered as I looked into that deer's
eyes, imagining. I saw the grace and
living passion passing, and I never
could harm a flea, a living thing,
another me. For what difference
did any of it make, 'Nothing'
stood there looking
back at me.

3248. TAKES THE POETRY CURLS

TAKES THE
POETRY CURLS
As much without thinking, he takes
the poetry curls; runs his hand through
his hair, a conflux of confusion, his conflict
his conceit, his conscience no concern at all.
-
'Just seems like a penchant for
dreaming.' Someone else was
heard to utter, 'No specific means
of domination on that one; a walk
in the park, I think.' He takes the
poetry curls, runs his hands
without thinking.