3411. TRUTH BEAUTY BEAUTY TRUTH

TRUTH BEAUTY 

BEAUTY TRUTH

The same coin having two sides holds 

within its reference two coins to coincide

each with the other side. There is simply

no alternative, it is the way things are  -  

reality is self-referential alone and, amidst

all other things, it brings forth its presence,

into which we roam. Our grip? Our baggage? 

What we take? Assumptions, reactions, opinions

and ideas  -  all the shingles of a poor man's house.

-

I can't exactly make love to the moment, for

when I reach to embrace it, it is already gone.

And, once gone, it ambles its way through the

dense parlor of moment, which is exactly - and

really - what Reality is anyway. We are stuck

and fraught with our own peril.

-

To my left, tall buildings resound  -  the steel

might and riveted strength of matter imagined

holds them up, upon a bedrock of common

assumptions. All those things that, yes, will

stand wherever it is they may  -  and if it is

all done right it is automatic. Truth to beauty,

and to beauty, truth.

3410. TAKE MOONBEAMS HOME IN A JAR

TAKE MOONBEAMS 

HOME IN A JAR

Yellow things to which I need tend : I have to listen

to all these voices of men on their missions. The

cacophony of cars and planes and boats falling over.

Those people who seek their own ends, failing in

wisdom but feeling intense. Their endings? 'Let us

dine in Jerusalem. This is all a commentary on the 

Kaballah - and it was over already, and incredibly 

so - by the time that Moses was gone.' No, no I

cannot listen any longer and it is all one world,

the now and the then and all those ancient Jews

with their primitive stories and their God: today's

modern Shylocks making one more insider's deal.

3409. SPEED FILLED WITH NOTHING

SPEED FILLED 

WITH NOTHING

I am going to say that you must arrive, heading

downward, your face in a filter, your hands in

the grave. Already all this is surmised by anyone

truly in the know. The capsule within which you 

are riding has long ago capsized and is rolling

over, pitch and yaw, over and upon itself. There's

no choir in the loft : above your head only an old

and raging highway roars; cars filled with speed,

speed filled with nothing.

3408. LASH OUT AT THE GENERALS

LASH OUT AT THE GENERALS

(Satori, the end of desire)

When it seems like nothing wants to work, like nothing

wants to go, I walk away and start backwards my rambly

trek. Along Tillary Street, buildings tarry and seem to wait -

great, arched legworks of bridge and cable, high in the air,

to be seen but only between other buildings  -  like some

sneaky, secret eye, ever-watchful and present. A distant

water vista beckons, but  -  it seems  -  only diners scurry

to and fro, Rive Cafe this, River Cafe that, and I am oh so

tired of all that I see. What use, this awesome life?

-

Beneath a sidewalk tree, I see a wine bottle, broken off

at the bottom, blunted, like a glass-weapon ready to throw

its shards aloft. It was not there yesterday, this I know  -  so

only to assume some drunken midnight reveler has thrown it

down, like so many other things. The one, black leather glove,

the woman's panties somehow hanging from a tree. What goes

on these drunken nights? Things I never see? It really does seem

that nothing wants to work, or, at the least, work as it should.

-

Brooklyn, all night, beneath those crazy awnings and the

barrel-fisted buildings beneath the two sublimes : bridges

on ahead, over-top, soaring and gorging where once the

ferries stopped and all their Whitman dotage ambled.

I know now I'll have nothing of it  -  this stupid, bloated,

modern day, the couch store with its leathers, the book

store soiled with its sex, the clothing that only fey watchmen

would ever wear. I pass on everything. I pass, and wonder

why I'm here: not for the momentary drizzle of this cold

and so disgusting rain. Not to seek some Hart Crane

blunder chasing men and all their gain. Remember,

as I've told you, I want for nothing, and never will.

3407. FIND BUT A WAY TO KEEP ME GOING

FIND BUT A WAY

TO KEEP ME GOING

I have never really learned how to love, though

I'm pretty good at hate. I do love you though.

I'd have to say: 'without compunction, sunk to

my knees, down in the hollow, lost in the swamp

of my heart.' It seems like all that is true (enough).

-

Do you remember, that one time in the dark of night,

when we stumbled onto that carousel in darkness  - 

all closed, no lights, and all those happy horses

seeming frozen in their jump? I laughed for ten

minutes as you lifted up your dress to pee at the

horses' feet. Don't know why, to this day. But it

was ever so funny, and led to our great romp in

the summer grass. Girls still crouch? I guess.

-

My magazine slumber, my days against your arch,

my open hands for your love and magic, my open

eyes, oh, just to watch. So long ago and all so over

now. My love, I've grown so old, even my decibels

of sound are feeble. Help me, help me please.

Find but a way to keep me going.

3406. CHARLES BAUDELAIRE

CHARLES BAUDELAIRE

If you had to give it a name, you would. The name

would come to you  -  as whether gloomy or with glee

I do not know. Nothing of that nature ever surfaces.

Great and enormous eyelashes, put on with such an

excellent care, do well their appointed task. They

elicit response, make someone like me look twice.

-

As my friend Joseph used to say - before he

painted the windshield red with his blood and 

brains - 'What are people thinking? All you

need is a little when a little is a lot.' It never

bottomed out, this idea. From that point,

we just sailed on.

-

('Pleasure invites me, and I wear love's crown').

3405. J'MAINTENANT

J'MAINTENANT

This guy was speaking some Creole French I couldn't ever

understand  -  even here in the French quarter, of brazen

hippos and over-the-hill whores. He wouldn't shut up and some

Molly Bloom type, I swear, was puking on his shoes. I reached

over to tuck at his lapel  -  'I maintain your feet are wet.' I actually

did try to say that in French, but it came out a slobbering mess.

-

Third floor balconies held sunshine hookers. Two fiends from

Missouri were drinking in the street, sitting on the curb, settling

accounts with Monsieur Constabulent, who'd just flown in from

St. Petersburg, filming a documentary on biological variations.

Everywhere above us, the pale sky was shimmering with its

elixir of doubt and wonder soon to pour down upon our heads.

-

Thursday, the Virgin Mary arrives; done up in robes and

ermine, she stays in place along the edge of a singular wall.

The locals come to visit, scrounging for change to throw

in her cup. 'She looks more like Lady Bagatelle than anything

I'd ever do. I love the way her nose dribbles a holy drip.'

Creole religion, masterful mysteries and bayou suicides,

all wrapped up in one big, swirling enigma, j'maintenant.

3404. DIAMONDS

DIAMONDS

She is viewing a weather map over the land; watching

as that green blob of rain moves over the Alleghenies  -  

watching, for no reason at all, what I can sense to be

anti-climactic for sure. Her delicate diamond hands

trace a line along across the screen. To show me a

something or other. I want to mention, as her hand

passes over, that I once lived here, I once lived there;

curiously, beneath that green blob signifying rain.

Now, I don't know how I live in this world at all.

-

Once, a long time ago, I lived beneath a bridge.

The bridge ran over the Kill Van Kull; across

the way, at all hours in those dark, drear' days

ran river traffic of tankers and tugs, steamers and

scows. Everyday, there were things being towed or

salvaged, old ferries being taken to rest, bent tankers

to be washed out to sea. Above my head ran the lines

of the bridge, as everything, through the Narrows

was silently dragged out to sea.
-
I don't know how I live in this world now at all.

3403. TWO GUYS

TWO GUYS

Two guys like a Jack Kerouac and his

buddy Dean are huddled under the hood 

of their car  -  yes, it's a Hudson from a 

long time ago, a Hornet or a Wasp (they

made them both in the  early 1950's), 

and what a stupid joke was that. These

two are changing a generator; the one

guy has a simple black belt in his hand,

the small and simple kind, like they used to

make, not the serpentine fan belts of today.

They've also, I see, dropped the oil-pan

and will be replacing the gasket. Yes, yes,

I realize in my travels, there are some men 

who do nothing but talk like ladies, on and 

on  -  I see them everyday  -  while others,

with their hands, will work things to the bone.

-

Out along Fifth Avenue, by the church at

Twelfth Street, in 1967 there was a Hudson

Hornet I remember  -  big and heavy and black  -

that sat at the curb, abandoned it seemed, for

nearly an entire year, right through the four

changing seasons  -  snow and grime and leafs

and slime  -  just waiting for something at

the Church of the Transfiguration.

3402. I'M WORRIED ABOUT SYMBOLS

I'M WORRIED 

ABOUT SYMBOLS

(Ianthe)

Closing the book, I look up to

see lights  -  they are broad and

yellow, as if enforcing sunlight and

warmth. Golden Gate Park comes

to mind  -  all that crystal and silver

light, like water, dripping down 

from Geary Street. What are

things anyway, but ideas?

3401. THE GIVENS

THE GIVENS

(2012)

Everyone wants to live forever, or at least not die -

though there are probably a few they wish dead.

Everyone wants traffic to flow their way, as and

when needed, and then scoffs at jams when traffic

for others is stopped. Each wants the roadway

running right to their door. Everyone wants a

certain light when darkness comes, and some

darkness as well when it seems way too light.

The limelight when it's quiet, and the quiet when

life gets too much. And all that stuff about money

being evil, the love of, the pursuit of, everyone seems

to have a thirst that's never quenched until they get

it, then they start bawling about how crummy it is.

Park that large car right where the gas station ends.

Leave it to others, and then make amends  -  and

everyone's got a gimmick they're trying to sell,

 even if first they need sell to themselves.

3400. HOW NICE IS ALL THAT?

HOW NICE IS ALL THAT?

Somehow, the overnight full moon is on my left at

5am; I am swimming around in memories : my napkin

exfoliates, there is a perfect stillness in the darkened

trees, the air holds secrets and Time itself is leaving

new messages and running on. I stand alone, here,

to entreat an entry into some newer life. How akin 

to nothing at all, how different really, is any of

that...How nice is it actually at all?

-

I shouldn't know, and I never will : carparks and

carports, garages and lots, everything all jumbled

together. This wild world sleeps, silent and stable,

in its slumber, while I take these messages back.

I once walked the stars in my own cosmic twinkle.

Now, new lines bring me back and keep me on

this Earth. And how nice is all that?

3399. CANTILEVERED CAVALRY

CANTILEVERED CAVALRY

How can I make lightness from your damned and heavy

presence; crossing out words on paper, eliciting no response

at all from crowds of hundreds with ears and eyes. I look around

me, sometimes just to check that there's not some hateful yet

marvelous bird of prey about to swoop down onto my head.

I miss the heat and the warmth of early summer mornings.

I have nowhere any longer to sit in the cold  -  pre-dawn and

all its pretty lights are nothing against the frigid air. And the

brightness I'm waiting for takes way too long to arrive.

The rightness I'm waiting for takes way too long to come.

-

I'm walking the planks of an old railroad bridge.

Abandoned now, and forgotten, it goes nowhere at all.

There hasn't been a train here for decades. All the old

sheds are hollow and zero and fallen and crumbled.

High, high above my head, and high above this soft

and marshy ground as well, the New Jersey Turnpike

roars. It roars with all its stupid people passing, going

as swift as their shit will take them, past the old rocks

of Laurel Hill, now mostly gone as well, blown apart

by dynamite and road-builders intent upon destruction.

-

A long, long time ago, atop that pile of rock, there was an

asylum, a crazy house, a sanitarium  -  whatever cheating

words they use to describe such places. Nothing was left,

for years, except a very tall and skinny, brick chimney.

The old graves were moved, and the charnel house too

became merely myth  -  some nasty old Hackensack

Meadow punchline, pig-farm joke, marshland metaphor:

'The crazy dead died crazy, until they were not any more.'

-

We moved them all, and took them away,

we moved them all away. (How could we

make likeness from their damned and

heavy presence? The rightness I'm

waiting for takes way too long to come).

 

3398. OK THEN, YES

OK THEN, YES

Once I lived in far hills and distant climes,

playing the piano to cows and horses at dawn,

watching the run of sunlight on the face of two

ponds, with geese and ducks lining the weeded

banks while turtles and bullfrogs squabbed and

tittered  -  whatever it is those things do in idle

time. I've never had a crayon like that in my life

again. Now everything's changed, the clouds

darken and lower, the wind brings itself up to 

speeds unknown, and even the whippoorwill

once fond of me enough to sing, now

does, by contrast, nothing.

3397. STEEL GIRDERS

STEEL GIRDERS

I have been trounced by steel girders; there are

steel girders in my mind, squeezing my loins,

they run through my eyes and they have now,

already, broken both my hands. I am trussed

on steel girders, onto which have been stenciled,

(by someone), 'logic,' 'rationality,' 'presumption,'

'good sense,' and hundreds more. These are

small, little words somehow extending out past

the girders' ends as they, in turn, go on to

describe concepts, very large concepts, broad,

and vastly bigger than themselves.

-

Today I passed a Lotus dealer once again.

Out front, and inside, piles of expensive cars -

Ferrari, Porsche Carrera, a vintage '56 Lincoln,

numerous new Lotus cars, and a few old

sports cars as well, all in perfect shape. It

seemed the only people walking around there

were wealthy folk : especially some older,

capsized hippie type leftover from '71, in

perfect 'worn' jeans, a nice pair of boots and

a weatheredly haggard hippie face anyone

of that era could be proud to have. Yet now

he shopped for expensive cars, and what's

that tell you, you tell me. We agree?

-

I have steel girders pinching all my nerves,

extending out my crotch, piercing my innards

with pain, and bursting my spleen. I don't even

know what that is, actually. Baudelaire? or Verlaine?

3396. NOW AIN'T THAT SO VERY SWEET

NOW AIN'T THAT 

SO VERY SWEET

Eagerly awaited anticipated advance breaking

all barriers  -  all those background voices

chumming : eagles and angels and ladies

and lords. And oh so little I ever really knew.

They painted the old building a light shade

now of blue. It looks like Heaven in its own

pale manner. Oh, damn, just another place

I never have been. Now ain't that

so very sweet?

3395. PROBABLY NO ONE NOTICES

PROBABLY NO ONE NOTICES

I'd like a good, stirred woman, naked to the waist, 
stretched out on velvet, just waiting for me. 
Someone to love, someone to touch. I'd like

 jello on her chocolate, ivy on her vines, 
water on her pasture, and all the rest  - 

those sinewy, soft, lentil-like legations of

all those crazy l's  - love, lust, licking, landing. 
Hats off t0 Larry, and all that magical matter 
that transforms a life of death to a life that matters, 
or, at the least, figures for better, for something at all.

3394. RUTH CARRADINE

RUTH CARRADINE

...As biblical as they come, your righteous form

will drop me dead, you and your picnic lunch on 

an oceanfront rock, some ancient boulder-stone 

from aeons past you never recognize. Sitting there 

like some half-reserved yet deadly stupid diva 

gazing out to sea : the dividing line drawn between 

you and me. I'll never have the courage to lose 

this last reserve I'm keeping. Absence makes the

heart grow longer; fat muscle, doomed-pulser

to the sun and stars above.

3393. THREE KINGS DAY

THREE KINGS DAY

I don't care what today is. You say it is 'Three Kings

Day' - as if some worn and tired religious convention

would make any difference to me. Orthodox, Greek,

Catholic, Armenian  -  any rite you'd choose  -  they

are each as equally stupid as putting shoes on a goose.

High-stepping through shit, avoiding rubble along the 

way, arguing  -  with the guilt of some sick medievalist  -

about the number of angels on the head of a pin.

3392. GATES OF ALTOONA

GATES OF ALTOONA

Marvelous hings, like benefactors, arise out

of nowhere to carry you home : the small noise

in the yellowed harbor, pale in moon and dark in 

sun, is nothing but the slap of water on an old,

tired wharf. Everyone has left. You are once

again alone. That solo lets you see.

-

You remember other times : the girl by the

wavering pine, with her glitter and chafe, all 

that silk of scarf around her neck. She

let herself become yours, and then, over

time, it all disappeared. Now, back to

that persuading gulf again, you sit up,

late nights, staring out to the harbor boats.

3391. LANDSLIDE

LANDSLIDE

Rocks and rubble, all this beneath

which we lie  -  don't disturb the

lay of this land, even as we search

it : a fossil tone that reminds us of

something else. I could have warned

you of fifty things, and even if ten

had come true my chances of

being right were probably valid.

Beware then the rub  -  the

mountain now sits on you.

3390. CHOIRS OF WORMLETS

CHOIRS OF WORMLETS

I have chastised all to the fore

and beaten them down and made

chase of shadow and rivulet and

runner and run. It is nothing very

populous, this popular delusion.

I will harbor your heart in my

hands, and hold all of your

hesitant hopes within these

moments of my making -

all of your dreams in my

drama. My blood shall 

pulse your heart, and I

will spill new seed on

your lily-white belly.

3389. SOLDIERS

SOLDIERS

If murder is the measure, that leaves

off soldiers and military men  -  they

can go on and live their stupid lives

forever; without a thought of guilt or

the troubles it has caused. After

all, one must say, in their view,

'we just did what we were told.'

3388. RECOLLECTION

RECOLLECTION

In this first cold of Winter  - nine degrees  -

the ice is hanging from the loom, and a mother

who died in the kitchen now sings in the other

room.  A tea-cozy, hand-knitted, it seems, 

of one shape or another, is at rest next to

a toaster on the pale-green counter-top.

'Anyway, Death be not proud' the

embroider reads. A thin light crosses

from another vantage the view across

the yard. My eyes wander and,

 again it seems, I can't keep them
down, or at least it's hard.

3387. WISE AND GENTLE WISDOM FOR LIVING A KIND AND GENEROUS LIFE

WISE AND GENTLE WISDOM 
FOR LIVING A KIND AND
GENEROUS LIFE

(deeply spiritual life)

The man is reading Henry Nouwen in a very

considered manner  -  he is blessing his bread

and coffee, holding his book in a caress and

(I sense) feeling forth for a meaningful life  -  

while, just next to him, some retired professor

in a straight-man's smock is railing about

Venezuela's nationalized oilfields. 

Pipelines and revolutions, to the

heart or through the soul. 

The first man, I notice 

now, is leaving with his

butter-pad knife.

3386. IT WAS SO EASY BEING JAMES MERRILL

IT WAS SO EASY 

BEING JAMES MERRILL

(Philadelphia)

There was an old man saying to me, 'you get just

what the traffic will bear; with that you must be

satisfied, there is no other there there.' Once I

nodded I moved away. The trolley tracks were

in the street, but it was New Year's Day -

no trolleys were running, just buses.

-

I never liked music by Marvin Gaye. It

always seemed so stupid; especially the

one that goes 'dum dum dum da de da

dum' (sorta')  - and then, of course, the

crass disaster which is What's Going On?'

Oh no! I've done it again, mixing up Otis

Redding and Marvin Gaye  -  one dead

in a plane crash, one whom his father

would slay. But what's the

difference anyway?

-

Medical miracles, it is said, now rule the

day : of course it's all untrue and everything

is a dastardly lie. There is just nothing

that special in living on, nor anything

that special in dying. And the trolleys 

are not running today.

3385. CHIMERA

CHIMERA

On the northland coastline, I saw the figment

of a girl. She was holding candles, and wearing a

long white dress. Shroud like, her fabric blew around

her, as if there was, really, nothing underneath. But

I'd known her for years, and had loved her as much as

once I loved myself  -  we were guests of each other,

it seemed. One day she disappeared, or just appeared to

up and vanish, taking all my heart along with her then  - 

it was a false memory, everyday, I related to. My visions

of her, unceasing, called constantly back to me. And now,

here she was again. I wanted to go, oh I wanted to run,

but the invisible divide between us now held me in check.

Like the cloth itself, that varied fabric of Time between us

had cut asunder what once was our world  -  she was a

spirit now, and I was but a measly, forlorn man, outwitted

and waiting, and outwitted once more  -  for nothing

in the end at all but a figment, a spirit, a chimera

of all I had ever once desired.

3384. YELLING ABOUT HIS FUTURE

YELLING ABOUT HIS FUTURE
(always in a hurry)

And oh so much has been let down : the guy

with the noose around his neck, yes, I've seen him

madly running off along Macarber Road. He was

holding something in his hand, and yelling about

his future. Never did stop to talk, even though I

beckoned. Some people are always in a hurry.

3383. EMBARRASSMENT OF RICHES

EMBARRASMENT OF RICHES

I am not a fool, not yet anyway  -  I see the stars

but do not stare, see the sun but do not swoon. It's

all my form of some precise matriculation to another

level of learning : three angels, perched in a tree; a

dog, wiling time away by speaking in tongues. None

of this throws me. I sit back and laugh. And yet, yes,

I'd like to be the one who catches starlight in a jar

or even wishes in a bucket, but I'd really then have

nowhere to go wIth any of that. My life is not to be

a storehouse of any sort of moment - my time

amasses moments un-recalled. I have too

much of any one thing to be simply

looking for another.

3382. MAGIC CAR

MAGIC CAR 

Yes, yes, arrive, come on, aboard, enter. 

This is all of the magnificence we have. 

Why is it all so specific? How do 

we learn the moment? Along the 

roadway, the landscape moves.

I see the passing of hundreds 

of shapes. I stand alone, 

face to the wind. No

one pulls me back in.

3381. IN PASSING

IN PASSING

I don't want to talk about Morreale. I'm here

to live and die, nothing more. I don't wish to

preserve the lines of that fence, make sure the

gate-latch closes, whitewash the pale, check

the shed door. I'm here to live and die, and 

nothing more; and that I shall surely do.

And that, I shall surely do.

3380. ETERNAL RECURRENCE AGAIN

ETERNAL RECURRENCE AGAIN

Everything around me is dark. I am seeing

things through a broken still-camera in my

heart. All things are dark and gloomy...

this darkness is looking good.

-

This big painting, by Velazquez, is

looming over my head : 'The Surrender

of the Dutch at Breda', or something like

that. Fires and pyres, the big, brown rump

of a horse, lances and spears, and then

that soldier, staring out at me. Brown

and blue, my heart again.

-

There is nothing more difficult to hide

than Fear  -  it makes us shake and

shudder, just with memories of our

days. I wouldn't know why, nor what

it's possibly worth. To be or not,

that question comes back, and the

fires seem still burning on Breda's

wharves  -  eternal recurrence again.

-

Instead. Instead, I want to be thinking

about 'Las Meninas'  -  'The Spinners',

also by Velazquez  -  the other picture

in my mind : the reflection of a King and

Queen in a stupid, awful mirror - who cares,

of that? - the painting within a painting - 'oh,

what is that?'' - the little, red jug held by

the maid, the little boy who kicks the dog,

and, the little girl, being handed that jug.

All this, like words; so much at once.

-

And who am I, that this matters? Traveling

time, five centuries near, to bespeak some

ancient and doddering painting : dumb Dutch,

bold Spaniard, doped Italian, all! Time stops,

and it happens again and again. Everything

around me is dark. I am seeing through a

broken still-camera in my heart. 

Eternal recurrence again.

3379. IT'S TOO LATE TO STOP IT NOW

IT'S TOO LATE 

TO STOP IT NOW

Nothing moves forward, all things stop.

Even the Jewish Islamicist nearby, by his own

definition I hear, wants new settlement stopped.

Yes, but 'no one knows how the women

feel about this (for instance, ask Jodie).'

-

'We've a need to find common ground, I

think, instead. My friend moved there, he

met someone from South Africa, as they

rented a house together  -  met, married,

and carried on. Later, she was killed by

a terrorist bomb in a market square. But,

hey, who's to say about anything?'

-

Phoenicians at one time ruled the nearby

sea  -  they traveled the waters at will,

transporting great cedars by limb and

by trunk and all cuttings. It has been

like that forever  -  even a long time

ago. Too late to stop it now.

-

'Oh, by the way, you can tell my father

that I finally caught that medieval lungfish

he was so long chasing after. With all

the bother and fuss he put forth, it was

really not too much of a matter.'

3378. LOTS OF CIGARETTE MONEY

LOTS OF CIGARETTE MONEY

I do not smoke, and Man does not

lightly alight from plane, boat or ship

thinking of continuance or pleasure

and pomp. Certain things lead to

certain things, while others just go

on. To tell you the truth, I do not

care and it does not matter. By chance,

there is a 'Quik-Chek' on the corner -

cars are parked and people mingle.

-

You are near enough, while others

are far away : Bakersfield, California

(is that the Central Valley?) and 

El Paso, Texas  -  both those places

hold folk eternal and people I know.

Those hinterland, well-topped hills

of Hollywood and Vine : crap-happy

scene stars, the dead and all the rest,

with their sad and droopy faces, watch.

-

I came through darkened woods  -  

where the paved road had long ago

ended. A few houses, scattered about,

with streams and ponds, led me to see

I was traveling on dirt, with nothing that

was paved or surfaced, and that I was,

really was, just living in a dream.

Really, just living in a dream.

3377. THE ART OF SECRECY

THE ART OF SECRECY

And all that Fargo noise : it goes 

nowhere, all this blarney and froth.

It keeps making sound nonetheless.

I can look forward to so many things.

3376. WELL, ALL THAT'S GOOD

WELL, ALL THAT'S GOOD
(for helene grimaud)

And the sun will shine forever and your

lips will always glisten while your eyes

shall always smile, and I will be at your

side forever. Of such feelings is my felicity

made. I clamor for things of you. I harp

at your musical well. Let me listen anew.

3375. UNTIL IT IS THAT I AM LOST

UNTIL IT IS THAT I AM LOST

A little does not mean a lot, nor does a lot

mean anything much. Until it is that I am

lost I will be without avail : nothing to go to,

no rudder to grasp. Others tell me all that

is really the opposite of being lost. Having

a rudder to grasp does not mean not having

one  -  and the use of 'until' breaks the code.

Nonetheless, whatever they say, I am lost until...

3374. AVERAGE TITLE

AVERAGE TITLE

The average title comes and goes; we are nothing

without it, and it is nothing but for us. These are simple

items : disparage one, and the other is gone. Like at the

woods which line the old field, the farmer's trespass

and the wild of deer and turkey overlap. One day the

juncture works  -  water and corn and barley  -  and

the next day everything is barren and dry. We wait for

an average  -  the normal season to come which will

balance all things out. Until it arrives, we just go on.

3373. POLITENESS AND WAGER

POLITENESS AND WAGER

There are two flowers on the stairway, each in

a separate vase, on the landing shelf. People pass

and notice : the blue water  -   it seems, though it's

only blue because of colored glass  -  and the sunlight

throwing varied shadows of these items on the pale,

white-painted walls. Different dimensions all through

the day. Light passes and light changes, all that we see.

-

In dresses and gowns, some women pass. In cassocks

and beads, two priests go by, oddly. They are holding

a chalice, one, and a lit candle, the other. Liturgical

folk, for some reason here, going about their funereal

task. In the other room, as I see through, the deep

crimson back wall is crowded with more flowers,

funeral sprays and bouquets. Yes, yes, there is

someone's old body displayed, I see the open

casket in a strange half-light. Am I myself in

death or dying? Between two places I neither

really know or care of? Nay, I am well alive,

proven just by all these observations, no?

-

I wouldn't want this half-life ending to be blemished

nor  -  for that matter  -  abbreviated or cut short.

So, by those means, I am - I do suppose - placated

and made happy still. I see. I touch. I feel.

This is somehow living, and I will be

as nice as I can be.

3372. JONAH SAL

JONAH SAL

There won't be an ending and there won't be a

meaning : I promise you both of those. At the

wharfside, there shall still be ladies eating 

crackers with their soup, maidenhair ferns,

and daughters with rings.  As you know,

none of that ever changes. Way out, on

the far-side sky, if you were to look, there

would still be seagulls, moon and sun and  -

floating so flat and ephemeral on the ocean's

odd horizon  -  the one or two distant tankers

at sea. None of that changes either. And then,

of a sudden, in an instant, the fierce, fiery monster

will rise up its head, great noise will ensue, and  -  

stepping but like a figment over flaming seas  -  

the figure of all time and all fear will step out,

reach, and consume us, all and every.

3371. A COMIC TRIANGLE

A COMIC TRIANGLE

Two roads converged in a woods:

I took the middle one. Yogi Berra

was it said 'when you come to a fork

in the road, take it.' And additionally

it has been said 'nine-tenths of life is

just showing up' -  you see, you see,

I had no choice and I did not know

what else to do. It is grave

(though, no, not mine)

-

The circumstantial evidence now  -  

leading to a new land, bringing me to

newer places; my mind with my body

aches, even my crying-out teeth are

in terror. And so, just as it is, all

these same people are swarming

again : towards the middle, towards

the formative clay, towards their muddle.

-

I will not lead you on, I will not carry

anyone forth. Bring me your favor, 

carried on a tray, and I will give you,

back, yes, the head of a John the

Baptist. This comedy troupe beckons.

I can be, I really am, all things to all men.

3370. THIS EARTHLY BREAD

THIS EARTHLY BREAD

The bread is baking in this oven  -  

this uncut loaf, the still unsullied

thing, this marker for the morning

task. We watch the smoked and

colored glass turning  -  its small

window glaring back within  -  

something deep and

mysterious rises.

3369. WAITING FOR THE LIGHT (To Hit the Water)

WAITING FOR THE LIGHT

(To Hit the Water)

I am waiting for the light to hit

the water  -  all those torrid ripples

riding on the surface. This is the

'moment' I await, though it is ruined

by the noise and the presence of others.

Be ruined? Why should it not : prattle is

prattle, and what is not (what we've got)?

-

I notice the little oar bobbing; how it

looks like an arm or a leg on the water  -

who has lost what must first be determined,

and - do we not - anyway all lose ourselves,

apart, piece by piece? Thus is time, and thus

is Life determined.

-

I think of you, in memory, though not

that often : things bleed and merge, meld

and mix  -  the sleeping, tired face, the

joy of lips and trace, the hand upon your

breast, I place  -  and all that crazy pleasure

which it brings. As the Roman God Priapus

asserted : 'Grant me a flowering youth! To

please with my naughty prick, that I may

chase away the worries that harm the soul

and that I may not fear too much the growing

old!' Anyway, why a God would say that,

I'll never know. And I am waiting for

the light to hit the water.

3368. EVERY DAY IS SOMETHING MISSED

EVERY DAY IS 

SOMETHING MISSED

Alabaster Nefertiti morning glory wine.

And all this memory has a tree. Along

the winding ridge at Waverly we are

picking riverbed fossils while, along

our back, Route 17 buzzes away

like a wild child  :  75 frantic miles

back to Binghamton grows. John

Gardner and Joe David Weil.

-

How easy need it be to judge others,

to choose and select and grade? It

would never be my place, the lording

over of what is seen. I've pre-supposed

my own reticence long ago, and put it

to the fore: like movie idols resting 

their rest, it all seems just to go on.

-

Blind man in a tub. Doctor on a limb.

Parson with a skate. All these bugs

and mollusks, all frozen in their

muddied time : picking fossils

in Waverly, seeking the rhyme.

When everything else fails, and

fails again, why not just give it up?

3367. ORIGINAL THEOLOGY

ORIGINAL THEOLOGY

The world is alive, and our great space

has its consciousness  -  the one which

holds us and embroils us and swaddles

and watches us  -  and hurts us too.

We call it many names, we have called 

it names. We call it many names.

-

Machine pellets and machine-gun wars,

broken friezes and shattered dreams, and

all the things that make the war of words.

3366. ONLY MY EMENDATION

ONLY MY EMENDATION

Particular matter is sometimes abhorrent :

(to'eba) let us call it. When the radiated sky

turns to red, when the green grass frizzles.

Rivers run as blood and men dress as women.

-

I walked proudly on, even as Judah and Tamar

wrestled of old. We know (now) Tamar won.

That battle was good as gold. 'I am just a

dry tree. I am just a dry tree.'

3365. MY FREE ITERATION

MY FREE ITERATION

I will make my associations as I

may and where I wish  -  the abstract

fault of a precipice. I will know no

man but those I stress, and leave me

alone with your angles.

3364. LIGHTS

LIGHTS

The wind is whipping bare the

trees  -  early morning light struggles

in, the street-signs stress and turn and

twist. Odd metallic noises make 

announcements - a garbage truck,

the street-sweeper, slide by. It is

the week before Christmas, or the

week after, again  -  it never really

matters, these chafing things. Someone

has put colored lights up along the window

glass. They dangle on their strings.

-

 We soon will have to move to another

year  -  the announcer says  -  begin

another circle, start another tear; while

those amongst me, taking their leave, run

to Ireland or Washington D.C. or their

own Buenos Aires. Circumnavigating

globes like idiot-savants in outer-space,

going out, coming back, returning safe.

-

It is the cold England or Norway of 

another year  -  and some newly meager

Christmas to return will re-appear, while

within my head still burns the heat of

Summer and all of its light.

3363. 'I AM A WHIRLWIND'

'I AM A WHIRLWIND'

Once entertained by desert winds

the high, fierce God comes down.

He walks upon the ground, 'midst

pines and willows, looking for more

to do : maniacal understanding,

insatiable force for energy and

growth. With that idea, everything

else is false and shallow. 'The Devil's

Kingdom, I'm willing to bet,' says this

strange, unfathomable force. 'I am a

whirlwind. I will boast to myself.' 

All at once, again, the fierce wind

comes through, and all

things disappear.

3362. DOUBLE JEOPARDY

DOUBLE JEOPARDY

Schooner sail-force sail-on windfest

harbinger hauler; five brave men on

the big, bad sea. 'If it was done once

already, we can do it again.' And with

that we make aces and faces, with

the high-hand salute. 'Around the world,

boys, we're going around the world again.'

3361. HOW CAN I SAY THIS : HOW CAN I NOT?

HOW CAN I SAY THIS : 

HOW CAN I NOT?

(this still-life holds a table)

I am supposed to have kept you -  

catalogued and noted and punched -

to remain in my notebook. This will never

be. Expansive to a fault, remnants and ideas, 

parts and places, they burst their bounds and

announce me out. Had I but the notion to

remain, (so off-putting, this being in place),

I would have done so. As it is, alas, without

you I go; but you are free, and - yes - that

is all we can be and, yes, all this can remain 

and you can go, or stay, as your whim will

dictate. (We then are all free beings to 

choose who or what to engage. By this

measure, so many engagements are enacted).

-

This still-life holds a table : 'It's anyway, like,

away from New York, you know, and we

have to pull all this together for her by

Saturday morning.' How can I say this:

how can I not?

3360. ALL AT ONE TIME

ALL AT ONE TIME

At the ellipse one stood out above all

the others : but who was it? A vagrant

personality, to be sure, alive and asleep

on the sewer grate and fencepost together.

Ron Kovic John Cheever Chevy Chase John

Ashbery all rolled into one. 'My dear, this is

such a key city, I must address its regression,

must I not? And oh, so many things just do

not work!' I am tired yet I am sleeping,

together, all at one time.