7146. COME TO CLAIM

COME TO CLAIM

'You are a madman, you know?' Maybe so. I have

come to claim the living and the dead together, to

walk them past the stream which separates their death 

from their life  -  where these things over-mingle and 

lap together. To show them there is no difference

between these two streams. 

-

As the sky swallows the light yet emits the same, 

we look up in wonder to see the exposition  -  and 

each manifestation of a point upon the compass'd 

wall  -  turn east to the see brilliance, 

turn west to watch it fall.

7145. THE GREAT WALL OF ENDINGS

THE GREAT WALL 

OF ENDINGS

Termilux. The light at the end of the tunnel?

Being that it's a train coming right at you, you'd

best move aside. Let the light pass you, let it by

you slide. There are five hundred reasons under

the sun not to do anything at all.

-

The waves revisit the beach : never ceasing, over and

over they arrive and retreat. Like the harried minions

of Mankind's own, running to scurry, only to return

again; a dribbling stain on a broad, wet stretch.

7144. AND THE FORCEFUL

AND THE FORCEFUL

Here it is, once again, Niagara Falls, and I am

swimming in rainbow blood, drifting. The barrel

is pretty tight and secure, yes, but it's no longer 1910.

Nor is it 1901; nothing really should matter : I am

encased now in plastic that will not break, with a body 

mold to clutch me perfectly, and, sealed into this 

compartment, there's  no movement nor any jarring 

motion to injure me. And it will all hold up  -  

all I need to is remain in place to survive. 

The modern age is my deliverance.

7143. THE STAGECOACH THIEF BLACK BART

THE STAGECOACH 
THIEF BLACK BART

He was a stage robber back in the day  -  the early day,

when the black plume smokers still ran across the prairies 

and plains. Bart would stop and enter, dressed in black, and

do the shame  -  take money, bags and jewelry, like that.

During California's Gold Rush days he'd always leave a

note. Funk Hill, Calaveras County, California, 1875.

Charles E. Boles, born in England.  "I've labored long

and hard for bread, for honor and for riches; but on my

corns too long you've tread, you fine-haired sons-of-bitches.

7142. MESMERIZED GONADS

MESMERIZED GONADS

Well, well, well, well anyway; something

was finally said. 'You drive me crazy with desire.'

I heard it, in the elevator, going up. Fourteenth

floor destination and those desires were blue. The

one guy said his arm was numb, and his girlfriend,

looking worried, still laughed it off. 'You'll be OK,

no one ever dies in America.' Two other people got

on, not knowing a thing, and kept talking about the

beach. Poor guy; jeez, I hope he made it. 

If this America only knew.

7141. BLACK-EYED

BLACK-EYED

'I want to pitch for the Giants and run for the Mets,

I want to drive one of them Cadillac Escalators, and 

right to the top! As good as it gets!' He spun around 

just once  -  it was a song of some sort, or at least a 

tune for his hand to stretch out. Fifty cents here, a 

dollar there. Funny stuff, good for the poor man.

-

All as it is, I'm stuck in a room with Melody Faye  -

she's a local critic of, well, of just about everything.

We met in the hallway of the old Village Voice, in a

skinny building no wider than her waist; or maybe not.

Here, I'm holding her again; it just goes like that. We're

supposed to be talking about the Whitney, and we are.

In between gasps. That's how this new world goes.

-

As Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan sang, 'I been everywhere

man.' Or, no, maybe it was just 'Wanted Man in....' I can't 

remember any longer those incidental things which once

pasted my scrapbook in memory for me. That's all over;

you may still look like the king's daughter, but it's not

important any more. I told her that as I was getting my

jacket and she was in the other room. We left together,

to go get a sandwich at some old downtown saloon.

7140. WALKING THIS HORSE

WALKING THIS HORSE

I am walking this horse to the fortress of time;

I cannot ride, (but I sure can rhyme?).

7139. ON THE SHELF OF TED MACOMBER

ON THE SHELF OF 

TED MACOMBER

I noticed beer bottles and a tray. The tray was

from some player's field in Milwaukee, where 

they made the beer  -   he said he collected things : 

coasters, trays, old beer bottles, openers, napkins,

cans and, even, matches. Apparently he did, yes

apparently he did. I'd seen this before  -  the same sort

of thing with race car guys, the NASCAR room, the

couch shaped like an IROC seat, or whatever. I

imagined it to be no different than a library, or a

roomful of books, for me. Collectible things,

not memorabilia exactly, no, just collectible.

-

Then the iced tea came out with the wife. Why that, I

wondered, and why not a beer? A true fidelity, I would

have thought  -  again, turning it back to myself, I figured

it to be the same as sitting in my library, amidst the books 

and the two chairs, and me bringing out comic books. I

didn't know; does a football guy watch baseball? And,

anyway, the wife was pleasant enough, and real fine to

see too. I was here to buy a car, nothing else, sign my

name, give him the cash, and split.

-

It's always so curious, how we dial in the scenes we live; 

well, me anyway. I'll remember this little one for a hundred 

years. How he had an Old Milwaukee lamp he wrote under,

signing the back of the title, and how his wife, still sweet, just

looked at me and smiled. Not once or twice, I mean, but almost

the entire time. How even the pen he used, down its side, said

'Schlitz'. I did my part, said thank you much, drank my tea, 

and left.

7138. SALLY FORTH ON MY ANTIQUE HORSE

SALLY FORTH ON 

MY ANTIQUE HORSE

The journey here needs a journal, for sure - 

something by which such records are kept. I

wouldn't otherwise know a thing nor remember.

Where it is I am, and was. What the name of this

section is  -  raggedy town of slumlords and geeks,

strange foreigners now trying to get it to work.

The Vietnamese guy with the sliced tongue, the

Malay who practices his kick-boxing in the morning

street; creating on some days a melee himself; and

that teen-aged kid he practices on, or with. Either way.

as I watch, it's a nasty ballet. The worn shop windows

of the ebony Gods; where they sell African clothing and

incense, while their wives read cards : fortunes, Gypsies

and Arabs and old kings and queens.

-

Before I was this rich, I was that poor. Before I could

talk good, I talked like them. Before I could write, I did

their scribble. In so many other ways, they represent me 

in my image of Past : that bent, antique horse clopping 

by, the one with the arc in its back.

7137. CANBERRA FOLD

CANBERRA FOLD

Like running from the scene of a crime makes any

difference  -  in the background the man was still

on the ground, bent over and bleeding from the head.

A woman was running off to the right. I felt a faint

half-light but was only to see partial things, all was

moving so fast : I am faint, I am complaint, I remain

silent. Am I complicit? Should I somehow reach out,

trip her up, bash her in the face? Would I be able to

do that? No, in all honesty, I do not think I could.

Butt then, if it were him instead, probably so much

easier, yet now it is him who is bleeding to death.

7136. ENTERING VALHALLA

ENTERING VALHALLA

The vicious minstrel lives by stealth, all of

his stringed instruments silent. Yet the winged

creatures around him, by contrast, seem to be

making all the noise. There is a blue smoke from

this Heaven rising. I can only lower my head.

-

We cross the threshold two by two, like Noah's

stalwart samples  -  walking aboard some dream-like

craft. The figure at the entry (no, I do not know what

it is) seems to tell me this is from where I'd begun.

I sense that I have come forth from this feeling before.

-

There is a master-section in the front, where the aura

of some greater being intensifies the light. Yes, now I

am in that arena, no longer trying to think, for that is of

little usefulness here. I am no longer what I was, the

'Human' of me has now dropped away. I curl and I

twist, only to realize I no longer inhabit those terms.

7135. I WISH THAT I COULD DO THIS OVER AND AGAIN

I WISH THAT I COULD DO 

THIS OVER AND AGAIN

She's placed her nice bicycle on those hooks once

more, so it's suspended now over the balcony. You're

not supposed to do that, but in these city studios the

only space you get is often really just what hangs

outside your window. In the country, there's a porch.

Not here. Like a poem, why clutter up this 

space with too much junk?

7134. BLUE SHOES

BLUE SHOES

I've lost the handle on my summation and now

there's nothing much else to say. All these selfish

university types wouldn't know the difference anyway.

I mean, guys with blue shoes? Come on.

7133. THIS CRUD ONCE MORE

THIS CRUD ONCE MORE

Three in the morning and there's not a light on

anywhere except right here, and I'm drinking this

crud again expecting it to keep me up : a dark brown

diffusion of coffee some six hours old. I don't really 

want it, but outside of living there's nothing else.

-

When I lived in deep country, this time of night, I'd

hear mysterious sounds  -  some form of croaking or

a warble, bunches of geese on their post-midnight way

(why they'd fly so, at night, I never knew), the goon of

a loon, sometimes, making that laughing horror.

-

Here, by contrast, what noises there are in the dead of

night are different : besides the trucks and nervous clanking,

there are sounds of steel and sounds of movement, the running

noise of that idiot's Yamaha or Suzuki - its late-darkness wail

and screech, a combination both of terror and speed combined.

He comes home, and enters, always, way too late for sense.

-

Ghosts and shadows, maybe, they too rest. The dead folk I

remember, they are sitting with me but nothing passes between

us. You know those fey religious types, the ones who claim the

ghost of God on every child's chin and the shibboleth of prayer

proclaiming a gracious way in, well, they'd have their say about

this I'm sure. I sit with a devil of my own conjuring.

-

There's nothing longer than a midnight lawn, and now that it's 

three AM, the lawn's just longer. My own dog's noises keep me

mental company as she rolls about and loses space in what can

seem only the deepest sleep I've ever witnessed.  The front door

hangs ajar  -  some sound of wind or at least the passage of air

rustles the countless leaves. Curt and succinct, like a parson's 

snideful oath; I hear it even if I try to ignore the sound.

-

I've not come far, in fact I've hardly moved and now find  -  just

as well  -  myself along in many respects right where I began.

Solid as a lunkhead, lost again in the form of thought that

only causes trouble. No, please, not all this crud again.

7132. ALL THE SCARS ON MY EYES

ALL THE SCARS 

ON MY EYES

It's no wonder I can no longer see; this is a

holy blindness. My eyes, like my soul, have

been singed and scarred  -  an everlasting fire

that will not quit. I walk unscathed amidst others,

yes, but they cannot see these wound I test. My

eyes are grown over with a thickness. Logic skims

the surface and I have to peel it off; a continual and

hazardous process which is so needed for all I do.

-

I cannot walk with other men; their ways are wrong 

their words unhinged. Anything they claim to see, I do

not see  -  this other world I dwell in has its own claims.

Fog and reality, sometimes clashing, sometimes same.

-

Draw me the metal from the valued well. Skip the ore,

and go right to the core : hand me the purest form of

anything you find. My hands are heavy, but they 

can hold my mind. I see the world now, yes, 

though only from a distance.

7131. WICKER BASKET BLUES

WICKER BASKET BLUES

Oh no. They've got that floating baby 

now that we sent down the river  -  

they've already given him a name and 

he's already doing sums for them.

Pythagorean logic, early mathematics, all 

that stuff. Next he'll be parting the Red Sea; 

I tell you, you just watch and see.

7130. EVERY ANGLE

EVERY ANGLE

She is here again : in this field where only

I know she hides. Silent, not aggrieved, though

sorrowful, she waits. I come here varied times

to stake my claim. And she accepts. This heart

is like a farm-field, sown and rich with promise.

7129. I HAVE THE SHIP HERE READY

I HAVE THE SHIP 

HERE READY

It seems, oh deluge, really, it seems we have

the ship ready : this awkward, almost living

craft, filled now with nothing but soon with all.

Shall we disembark? Or must we stay on board

while all those others things arrive? The someone

who has been talking with me had better not stop

now. I am ready, but I really know little else.

7128. 1978 - Three Poems of Russia. 'Ruki Nazad' (which means 'hands behind your back', and was the phrase the Secret Police would use upon apprehending a dissident)

THREE POEMS OF RUSSIA
1978
1.  The Russia that I know
     enchants the frozen trees
     until they learn to dance.
     -
     Erect, they split apart their
     unity, encasing all the seasons
     in the bier of ice proclaimed.
     -
     The forest sings the tune,
     along with all the Earth, and
     dances in the melody as well.
     -
     The Russia that I know
     enchants the frozen world
     until all things are dancing.
     -
     Held within its fear is
     quivered man, lest this
     fierce monster should arise.
     -
     (Lest this fierce monster should arise).
----------------------------------
2.   My white hands haunt the ancient cold.
      Icons to the stars, gold-gilted virgins,
      held in rare esteem, astound the empty walls.
      -
      Cold smokestacks puff from cabins in the
      snow. Short paths detect the horrid wastes
      of ice below. The workers sort, in wool,
      their winter source.
      -
      Red Army dozes, soft-to-snooze, asleep
      across the vast white waste; iced over
      far to Asia's strange expanse.
      -
      Europe short averts its eyes and wanders.
      White hands haunt the ancient cold.
      -
      Fingers tap the spittle from the broom.
      Small fires boil soup upon the stoves.
      The horses, pawing, seek another Spring.
      All quiet, Russia bows.
      -
      The soul too easy slumbers in a quick
      December nap, as balalaikas tumble from
      a daze, determined to be heard above the
      present roar. Cold steel snaps.
      Dreamed swords of hollow armor clink.
      -
      Moscow slithers in its slink of winter snow.
      White hands haunt the ancient cold.
      The prisoners bow, and sulk, and go.
--------------------------------
3.   Spear the difference, causing blind-eye
      vacant stares. All along the roadway the
      peasants are busy, washing their pots,
      cleaning their clothes, whistling for
      horses. There is a fire in every pit;
      meat broiling, potatoes close to crisp,
      and, everywhere, the singing of closed
      eyes. Vodka passes itself as real.
      The scene is one of Winter, always.
      The sky is passing close.
       -
      Wear those clothes that matter.
      The lines of mud routinely close the
      roads. Mired lamplights are cut to waxen
      images, black lines along the ceiling.
      These portend the favorite war, still
      fighting. Ice, and fire. The final
      story-line, the end.
      -
      Without reason, whatever grows, prospers.
      Thick and leafy green, the lettuce is
      carried in. Piled on tabletops from the
      south, with old bitches crying out, 'my
      eggplants and squash are the best!' And
      everywhere, liquor-of-fire. Towers, with
      blinking red lights. That is Moscow, far
      away, so close to zero, so near to the end.
-------------------------------------

7127. ALL HANDS

ALL HANDS

Desolation angels and all the rest : dark-night patrols

of cigarette smoke and whiskey. We always passed 

out on the dock. There was never anyone sensible around :

14th street junkies, Hudson Street whores, a jolly fag

or three trysting on the wooden walkway. Any cops

there were were on the take and only there for that 

reason anyway. 'Put that thing away boy, before I

shoot it off you.' Heard that plenty of times  -  an Irish

cop or two talking to someone equally swinish. The

Superior Ink Building, right nearby, threw its likely

shadows over the two contorted figures. My brothers,

my friends, what else are we going to do? It's 1968

and the whole entire world is sucking : things are

falling off as quickly as they're placed. I've got no

respect for Lyndon B., he's a Texas asshole sluggard

making war and lies together. Pedernales asswipe, a

truly insipid but evil man. All hands on deck

while we ring his neck. Any noise we heard was

overhead; the West Side Highway with all

overpasses crumbling, and the roar of 

town to the tunnel nearby.

7126. DON'T BELIEVE ALL YOU BELIEVE

DON'T BELIEVE 

ALL YOU BELIEVE

They tell me I'm seeing the future  -  and maybe in 

some ways they're right. The elopement of Time with 

its sweetheart Being makes for a curious sight. One

that engages us for sure : think of no other matter,

the light is on in the canyon, your hearts are 

blinker-free. Everything now is clarity.

-

Here Tupelo suits : he plays a certain solitaire

with his twisted hand. One side of the table is empty -

that's where no one sits. He never invites, he's always

alone. 'It wouldn't be solitaire if someone else was here.'

-

I don't argue, and he makes good sense  -  he used to drive

to his job every morning at 5am  -  watching everything, from

sunrises to wicked storms  -  just to experience a circular life.

'Up and out, one way, and back in the same way, just half a day 

later and more. No, I never enjoyed it, and hardly got paid for

my troubles, but -   like they say  -  that was my own doing, I

stayed and I tolerated. That little cyclone was in my own tornado.'

-

I find that you can't talk much to a guy like this : he resembles me.

I've lost more things than I can remember, and only sometimes they

yet turn up. I know I've written about this, and about that, and can 

recall it all pretty well  -  but, damn, I can't find half the time I've

done and I don't want to do it again.

7125. MY NASCENT REVOLUTION

MY NASCENT REVOLUTION

All those things are blooming again : ideas that come

to fruition. Let's march down Flower Street and shoot

off our mouths. There's a guy there holding a sign about

something : he's claiming to know what God says.

-

I can't retreat, but my charge hasn't started. Like my

gay friend Richard said : 'I spent this Summer at the

beach, reading all of Balzac!' I replied, curtly, 'I bet

you did,' meaning somehow to say ball-sac, but I

couldn't find a way. These Hamptons fellows

make me chuckle, so cute and ripe are they.

-

At eleven we start for the cape  -  lunch begins at noon.

There's a juggler at the entrance  -  he's pretty good actually,

three, four, five pieces in the air, and he keeps them aloft

ever while he quickly twirls around. Two cops stand by,

watching. Hard to keep order when things are (literally)

flying about. The juggler wears a jester's cap.

-

The surf here is nice too  -  all that Hamptons beach water

is on a long shallow shelf, so you can really walk out far

before it gets deep. It's a nice feeling, one of owning the

water in mind, while it twirls and gnashes around you.

Somewhere around here is where John O'Hara got

killed by a beach buggy  -  getting run down in

a dark-night accident along the beach. And it

was a safety-wagon, no less. Sometimes 

things just really go wrong.

7124. A PURE AND PERFECT BELIEF IN FOREVER

A PURE AND PERFECT 

BELIEF IN FOREVER

In a nugget - Hope and Love. What more decidedly

all-encompassing formulation can there be, and how

difficult, really, is this Life to see? We are clambering

for something together. There are a billion sliding people

walking among their sliding moments, the billion tunes

of an churchbell steeple somehow all playing at once.

We try to listen as we try to talk  -  to each other, all

over, one place at a time. Knowing so little, we still

go on -  pleasuring ourselves with this : a pure and

perfect belief in forever, which somehow 

keeps us intent on going on.

7123. WE PULVERIZE

WE PULVERIZE

Have I told you I won the Pulitzer Prize? 

If I did I was lying. I never wrote about 

anything sensible like that  -  though I did 

once take John Ashbery out for a walk. 

It was closing time at the prune-farm, 

and we were plum out of luck.

7122. NEUTRAL COLORS ON A BLIND RED FIELD

NEUTRAL COLORS ON 

A BLIND RED FIELD

Your brinkmanship makes me nervous, and I

really hate your fingers. The kids are piling

into their schoolbus again. There's no solution

to that stuff at all  -  they are simply excess, so

we send them away. If this were a real world, 

they would be ours, and we would teach them.

Instead we slough them off onto unsuccessful 

thinkers who need programs to survive.

-

I have the mettle to be Captain, and you should

pay me for things : start to set me up, bolster my

place. As it is, everything goes away for free and I

have to listen to those other things instead. Cats

and sympathy, and the heartfelt erasures of the

chalky brave. All I see is a world of blackboard

smudge, dancing now on a skein of electronics

and virtual reference to nothing at all.

-

He died, poor and alone, destitute and unhappy,

lonesome and unknown.

7121. TRAVELING LIGHT

TRAVELING LIGHT

I have a doily for a face,

and all the girls go under.

7120. VINCENT VAN GOGH IS PEELING

VINCENT VAN GOGH 

IS PEELING

In every stern divestiture of color and line

the language spoken is visionary and divine.

The broadening hands of a rubberized god make

things of a Nature sublime. Vincent. Vincent.

Shadows fall across the lake, where a number

of majestic birds are deciding their tracks : I can

hear their quaint ellipses - 'shall we squander

time, shall we fly once more, take to the sky,

again, this time?' Vincent, Vincent. Some

lily-white girl is approaching; I see she trails

a yellow shadow, but of light, and bright, not

a darkness at all. The blue sky, above her,

fissures its particles of twirling light - I see

she is there and not there alike. So, Vincent,

Vincent, just me  -  traveling through the likes

of time, with nowhere really to go at all.

Vincent, Vincent, do you hear my call?

7119. ENTERING VLADIVOSTOK

ENTERING 

VLADIVOSTOK

Curtains and the big tents are on the field :

a few struggling, white horses are hitting

the ground  -  that leg and hoof thing horses

do. A grizzled man by the gate is smoking

a stumpy cigarette. My paperwork, in order,

says 'go on in,' but I really don't want to listen.

I'm afraid of everything. The cold sunlight shines.

7118. WELL THEN

WELL THEN

'Looks like there's nothing gonna' take your place.'

I knew that and it's OK  -  sensitive feelings go away.

The shoeshine-spit-stumble I'm already used to and

the countrywide gabfest, well I'm tired of that too.

Sit me back, Parson Weems, I'm listening again.

Van Morrison goes on about Jelly Roll and 'oh 

the water', but I'd rather be dry : the big 

guitar is around his neck.

7117. SUITCASE OF NIGHT

SUITCASE OF NIGHT

It is heavy with blackness, this bag I drag and carry:

being the suitcase of the night, I cannot shake it until

there's a sun to rise. Then I can unstrap and open it up

to day. Light streams in; we bring it all back home.

And it is the coming back that is important, do you

not know? I can remember the time that white-haired

old man said to me (me, who was still wise and brash),

'Discover much; write everything down; and then come

back. It is very important that you come back. It is the

coming back that gives this sense and value.'

7116. TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS

TRAIN WHISTLE BLOWS

The train whistle that blows this early in the morning,

yes, I know that's not the one for me. I let it pass  -  

brought to its own (once-steaming) fruition by the

passage of wind and air. Blow past so fast, steed.

Long, long ago, on some open-prairie had I stood

there, the great, billowing cloud of smoke instead

would have had my notice  -  seeding like a long

cloud of fire over the trepidated ground. Now not.

Now instead the hum of electric and wire, passing

catenary connection to make things swiftly go. Even

the whistle I hear now is an electric blast of air.

7115. NEGATIVE CONVERGENCE

NEGATIVE CONVERGENCE

I grew up knowing nothing, but knowing that

the world would change. And change it did, and 

so did I. We are now so distant, parted, that these

two roads shall ne'er converge. I haven't a particle

of its sense within me, and want none either. Foul

things I keep far away, and more than removed from

my hands. I am Spirit, while it -  this world  - 
is still relegated to things.

7114. THE RIVER

THE RIVER

The river is as black and swollen as a face, 

with nowhere to go at all. All it can do is run

steady and stream with its own pulse of being :

like a heart, or an emotion, a fierce swash of time.

The willows bend to something, as they smother

the banks with their shade. A few ducks with a

rather-smile slowly work away. Their beaks speak

for them. I too amble away, sure of nothing, 

yet just as sure of all.

7113. MANIFEST DESTINY

MANIFEST DESTINY

Lamplighter destiny : they all come down 

from the campgrounds holding lanterns and 

seeking direction. I tell them the end is not

an ending and there is no going on. They 

are satisfied with that most stupid note. Up

above our heads, the McGuire Air Force jets

go screaming by. Wrightstown, I believe it is,

and such a miserable place  -  a dollar-store 

selling pens by the bundle of twelve, and a lurid

dance bar with half-naked girls where the airmen

relax reading Kindles. In the Mullica River, not so

far off, some kids are swimming naked, a few boys,

a few girls. They scream as a low-flying fighter-jet

takes a practice-dive over their heads. Like some

Vietnam horror-film-flashback, I see them on fire

and burning. It all lasts but a minute. Outside the

perimeter of the town, on Rt 206, a sign reads  -  in

front of yet another dance-bar, go-go girls is the term

still used  -  advertising its upcoming two-day party.

'99 dancers, all you can eat'. I want to laugh 'til I die.

7112. THE STRANGEST ANNULMENT

THE STRANGEST 

ANNULMENT

Read this : 'The absence of evidence is not

evidence of absence.' Such a lovely turn to

a phrase unwelcome. I use it here to refer

to extra-terrestrials. Those chimney climbers

we'd call aliens, only because  -  such a stupid

word  -  we'd know no better. I know them.

They're not. 'I think the whole notion of

'extra-terrestrial' is a notion of dualistic 

thinking anyway. We are extra-terrestrial

in a sense  -  our psyches are not confined

to Earth.' And we are the creators we so avidly

talk about and pray to. have you thought? It's 

all self-reflection in a bad interlude wherein we

deny our place in the God-Body we love. 

The natural is a pit of horror; and one has

nothing but the ancient assertions of Christianity

to give one the will to act. (And oh God, give me

the light to see...). Religion is a belief in a belief.

Anyone who needs it should have it, made to order.

7111. HAWK-WIND

HAWK-WIND

Hawk-wind, I'd not see you off the

point had I not into the heaven's gazed

and caught you sudden-sailing on the crest.

Had I known your company would visit,

I'd have prepared myself better to greet a

king, or, well, at least some royal thing.

No, a cackle is all I heard (is that the crowd?).

Hawk-wind, you are flying, and you are singing

loud? I would distant view your crest upon a

battlefield of sky, and know  -  deep in my heart  -  

the victor's come.

7110. LINK WRAY BUZZBOARD

LINK WRAY BUZZBOARD

And this is the way I write  -  wired iron of the

demi-sphere and halfway between places too. The

citadel sits on the high edge  -  no charm there, it

rests right where they built it. Yet the stupid tourists

come, with cameras and maps, to see the spots they've

read about : travel magazines, on-board flight-guides to

no-where-places at all. Screw that and let them have it.

And do you know what's buried in Grant's Tomb? Any

genuine, abiding, human interest, that's who.

-

For now, I yell. I am something like the engineer's soundboard

Marshall Mathers, but kept under wraps and held silent. 'He

thrashed about in local paroxysms of self- destruction.' That's

what the profile papers said. Psychological brine-water words

and all of the qualification that goes with it. I want to build walls,

walls on which to hang things, walls that will stay in place.

-

It's not mere words, it's more the relationship between the writer

and the reader. Invent again the teletype. Invent again the linear

line. On Tuesday, every other, the postman still delivers the issue.

Thank the Lord and the USA for that; appreciate what you have.

The cinder-blocks have ulcerated tumors, and I'm sure the

building itself will soon be collapsed as things just fall away.

You know about that center that cannot hold.

-

We make denominations telltale : reading Faulkner in a blaze

of haze, trying to pronounce those heavy words. OK then, what 

would I recommend? A flash-tag recipe book of cooking fish

and tossing salads. Green. Glacial melting. Fire-pan cooking.

Link Wray buzzboard. And all those crazy, hidden words.

7109. BRAMAFILL

BRAMAFILL

Keystone Cops and Berlnageur Hides.

This small, incessant showmanship keeps

the theatre alive : here, in a little Hudson town,

on a little Hudson ridge, where the cars cannot

be parked overnight, nor the Italian Cafe thrive.

-

I've heard tell how they commandeered this 

town once, to film 'the Purple Rose of Cairo.' I'm

thinking that must have been nice. A spotlight,

right now, scans the Tappan Zee sky for something.

Off to the distance, almost far away, the big city's

midnight lights are doubling on the water. On

the other shore, a Metro North train, or a Hudson

Valley Line train, slides by in silence. I can

never know the difference between the two.

7108. ROLL AWAY THE STONE

ROLL AWAY THE STONE

The Son is a state of mind : the Son of Being,

the Son of Presence, the Son of Creation. You

may choose. I light a candle to this darkness.

-

Only a lost history of writing would bring me to

this point : Salvation at the end of a gun, reading

line and verse of a sunburnt scripture written by

scribes in the Qumran caves

-

My coffee is from Istanbul. My lighter is from

France. My shroud, (they say), they say, is from

Turin. I like to keep them guessing of things.

7107. POUNDS TO WALLKILL

POUNDS TO WALLKILL

I saw a truckful of eyes on its way to hell :

carrying precious cargo to nowhere. The skinny

bridge tried spanning the chasm; almost but not

quiet. When everything was over, everything was

down. There wasn't much else to do but examine

the situation  -  as it were  -  and make sure

nothing like that would happen again.

7106. MOMENT MUSICAL

MOMENT MUSICALE

Up there somewhere nearby

is a woodpecker working hard,

though I cannot see it, only hear.

7105. ARTFUL DODGER

ARTFUL DODGER

The first thing I did when I awoke in Jebdo's trailer was

make coffee : I'd told him, 'Even for a hillbilly, you live

pretty low.' Making coffee? He claimed not to know. I

had to put the flies in order too -  since they were at most

everywhere. We were there to build a shed : so I said,

'Raise high the roofbeams, carpenters, and let's get

going.' He didn't get me at all. There was cat twirling

aimlessly in the rising sunlight, and the small corn

crib nearby  -  which he had transferred years back

to trash  -  was getting filled pretty high. 'My liege,'

I snickered, 'dost though not think  a trip to yon dump

be in order as well?' I might as well have tried pissing

on one of those flies  -  he'd didn't get me at all.

-

I'm not too impatient with really bad things, they just

make me nervous that's all. Inside this thing he called

a trailer-home, there were two curtains of burlap  -  

'Crenell's Country Feed Store' read the big tag, and 

the bags had once held some sort of powder. I'd guess

at, but not right at all. A pair of girl's flowery-pants

was thrown over the chair  -  'whose are those?' I

asked without commitment. He smiled that piggish

grin  -  'That's May-Linda from down the hill. I made

her run home with no pants on the other day. Ha! She'll

be back, and I bet today.' The sunlight now was blasting

in like a shotgun pump in an empty canyon's echo.

'Well, that's one way to keep a relationship going, 

I guess.' He grinned, 'Yep, it is.'

-

The first time I was ever here, it was on a work detail

with the Purvey Township Road Crew, doing a community

service stint. We were spreading tar along the gravel and

dust road. I was following slowly the big orange truck,

and I'd slosh hot tar with a Dooby-Stick (it was called)

on the cracks from the hot bucket I was carrying along.

It at least had wheels, so I could push, but it was still

hot as ever and a real pain to do. We got to Jebdo's

trailer and he came bounding out to kill. They had

some real doing to convince him they had a right

and that everything was good  -  above-board,

not snitching, no damage, We smoothed out

his road, and I finally went home.