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grown to give this gun to you that sings around another metal grip inside the stall that goes against the marker that has cuts and calculates their known deception, something ran instead around the parked encircles disks. wagon, tent was all that heard, no mouths were twice together found or borrowed in the ceiling of another torso promising this twice together head, this push through veins that gives your death another word, another his, another whipping rain with any arm and any end finished — pocketed amount that goes around the dust inside their word, their forest cut like wounded deer in sights they have you down around the bear that stole and bit no wash, no jail in beaming what had nothing in this earth to speak the level of their tongue that is all know, and all the S that Panamá has had in hand with me, I dream you were my heart all sewn together by their was and is is known right now

First there is the wind but not like the familiar wind but long and without lapses or falling away or surges of air as is usual but rather like the persistent pressure of a river or a running tide. This wind is from the other side and has an odor unlike the odor of the winds with us but like time if time had odor and were cold and carried a bitter and sharp taste like rust on the taste of snow or the fragrance of thunder. When the air has this taste of time the frontiers are not far from us. Then too there are the animals. There are always animals under the small trees. They belong neither to our side nor to theirs but are wild and because they are animals of such kind that wildness is unfamiliar in them as the horse for example or the goat and often sheep and dogs and like creatures their wandering there is strange and even terrifying signaling as it does the violation of custom and the subversion of order. There are also the unnatural lovers the distortion of images the penetration of mirrors and the inarticulate meanings of the dreams. The dreams are in turmoil like a squall of birds. Finally there is the evasion of those with whom we have come. It is at the frontiers that the companions desert us—that the girl returns to the old country that we are alone.

Noted to be the definitive bright morning of 10,000 calendars. The church bell melted. Rage of unrequited love became a terrible serpent. The morning star lowered like an enemy’s flag. A vampire’s mattress tumbled out at the outskirts of town. Ancient lanterns, suddenly thrown through the air, somewhere deep in the mountains. That night, in a snowy rural area, an elderly, powder-faced woman appeared on doorsteps in search of wine. Her origins, neatly wrapped in the cold dressing of a snowflake’s breath.

One container of spaghetti sauce Grandma made before she died. Two old pieces of wedding cake you couldn’t pay me to eat. Three snowballs from last winter slightly deformed, no longer fluffy. Four small flounder from the time Grandpa took me deep-sea fishing. Everything coated with a thick white layer of sadness.

You might come here Sunday on a whim. Say your life broke down. The last good kiss you had was years ago. You walk these streets laid out by the insane, past hotels that didn’t last, bars that did, the tortured try of local drivers to accelerate their lives. Only churches are kept up. The jail turned 70 this year. The only prisoner is always in, not knowing what he’s done. The principal supporting business now is rage. Hatred of the various grays the mountain sends, hatred of the mill, The Silver Bill repeal, the best liked girls who leave each year for Butte. One good restaurant and bars can’t wipe the boredom out. The 1907 boom, eight going silver mines, a dance floor built on springs— all memory resolves itself in gaze, in panoramic green you know the cattle eat or two stacks high above the town, two dead kilns, the huge mill in collapse for fifty years that won’t fall finally down. Isn’t this your life? That ancient kiss still burning out your eyes? Isn’t this defeat so accurate, the church bell simply seems a pure announcement: ring and no one comes? Don’t empty houses ring? Are magnesium and scorn sufficient to support a town, not just Philipsburg, but towns of towering blondes, good jazz and booze the world will never let you have until the town you came from dies inside? Say no to yourself. The old man, twenty when the jail was built, still laughs although his lips collapse. Someday soon, he says, I’ll go to sleep and not wake up. You tell him no. You’re talking to yourself. The car that brought you here still runs. The money you buy lunch with, no matter where it’s mined, is silver and the girl who serves your food is slender and her red hair lights the wall.

It happened to me once. Winter came, and snow quilted every inch. I stood on the soapbox, as I was told, and made staggering accusations. The public ignored, so I retreated behind the potted yew. I was waiting for a moment I was supposed to have on a balcony overlooking the giant, gridded landscape. The sounds I made underscored what I meant. The potted yew was the face that I wore. It was a metaphor for what could be. The public endured. I put the potted yew behind me. I made staggering an art. That wasn’t the truth though. Winter comes and negates all it covers. It doesn’t matter where I stand. The balcony is a floor without walls. The yew is a hurt that shadows. The instance lives beneath us. Not just us, everybody. The shadow hurts us. I make sounds like the truth. Fate and theft are involved. I think I told you this before. The floor is a wall that obscures. The yew is quilt without color. Shadow is a fate you involved. The yew on a balcony negates. I told you this before. I was left undone. It’s what I meant. Underneath everyone.

The sun is warm, the sky is clear, etc.... Quickly he taps a full nib twice to the mouth of his japan-ink bowl—harder than he had thought, if he had thought—smears the fine spattering with his sleeve, and continues, for whom haste is more purity than certainty, as anarchy is better than despotism— for this reason—that the former is for a season & that the latter is eternal.

Late, late yestreen I saw the new Moon, With the old Moon in her arms; And I fear, I fear, my Master dear! We shall have a deadly storm. (Ballad of Sir Patrick Spence) I Well! If the Bard was weather-wise, who made The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick Spence, This night, so tranquil now, will not go hence Unroused by winds, that ply a busier trade Than those which mould yon cloud in lazy flakes, Or the dull sobbing draft, that moans and rakes Upon the strings of this Æolian lute, Which better far were mute. For lo! the New-moon winter-bright! And overspread with phantom light, (With swimming phantom light o'erspread But rimmed and circled by a silver thread) I see the old Moon in her lap, foretelling The coming-on of rain and squally blast. And oh! that even now the gust were swelling, And the slant night-shower driving loud and fast! Those sounds which oft have raised me, whilst they awed, And sent my soul abroad, Might now perhaps their wonted impulse give, Might startle this dull pain, and make it move and live! II A grief without a pang, void, dark, and drear, A stifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief, Which finds no natural outlet, no relief, In word, or sigh, or tear— O Lady! in this wan and heartless mood, To other thoughts by yonder throstle woo'd, All this long eve, so balmy and serene, Have I been gazing on the western sky, And its peculiar tint of yellow green: And still I gaze—and with how blank an eye! And those thin clouds above, in flakes and bars, That give away their motion to the stars; Those stars, that glide behind them or between, Now sparkling, now bedimmed, but always seen: Yon crescent Moon, as fixed as if it grew In its own cloudless, starless lake of blue; I see them all so excellently fair, I see, not feel, how beautiful they are! III My genial spirits fail; And what can these avail To lift the smothering weight from off my breast? It were a vain endeavour, Though I should gaze for ever On that green light that lingers in the west: I may not hope from outward forms to win The passion and the life, whose fountains are within. IV O Lady! we receive but what we give, And in our life alone does Nature live: Ours is her wedding garment, ours her shroud! And would we aught behold, of higher worth, Than that inanimate cold world allowed To the poor loveless ever-anxious crowd, Ah! from the soul itself must issue forth A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud Enveloping the Earth— And from the soul itself must there be sent A sweet and potent voice, of its own birth, Of all sweet sounds the life and element! V O pure of heart! thou need'st not ask of me What this strong music in the soul may be! What, and wherein it doth exist, This light, this glory, this fair luminous mist, This beautiful and beauty-making power. Joy, virtuous Lady! Joy that ne'er was given, Save to the pure, and in their purest hour, Life, and Life's effluence, cloud at once and shower, Joy, Lady! is the spirit and the power, Which wedding Nature to us gives in dower A new Earth and new Heaven, Undreamt of by the sensual and the proud— Joy is the sweet voice, Joy the luminous cloud— We in ourselves rejoice! And thence flows all that charms or ear or sight, All melodies the echoes of that voice, All colours a suffusion from that light. VI There was a time when, though my path was rough, This joy within me dallied with distress, And all misfortunes were but as the stuff Whence Fancy made me dreams of happiness: For hope grew round me, like the twining vine, And fruits, and foliage, not my own, seemed mine. But now afflictions bow me down to earth: Nor care I that they rob me of my mirth; But oh! each visitation Suspends what nature gave me at my birth, My shaping spirit of Imagination. For not to think of what I needs must feel, But to be still and patient, all I can; And haply by abstruse research to steal From my own nature all the natural man— This was my sole resource, my only plan: Till that which suits a part infects the whole, And now is almost grown the habit of my soul. VII Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around my mind, Reality's dark dream! I turn from you, and listen to the wind, Which long has raved unnoticed. What a scream Of agony by torture lengthened out That lute sent forth! Thou Wind, that rav'st without, Bare crag, or mountain-tairn, or blasted tree, Or pine-grove whither woodman never clomb, Or lonely house, long held the witches' home, Methinks were fitter instruments for thee, Mad Lutanist! who in this month of showers, Of dark-brown gardens, and of peeping flowers, Mak'st Devils' yule, with worse than wintry song, The blossoms, buds, and timorous leaves among. Thou Actor, perfect in all tragic sounds! Thou mighty Poet, e'en to frenzy bold! What tell'st thou now about? 'Tis of the rushing of an host in rout, With groans, of trampled men, with smarting wounds— At once they groan with pain, and shudder with the cold! But hush! there is a pause of deepest silence! And all that noise, as of a rushing crowd, With groans, and tremulous shudderings—all is over— It tells another tale, with sounds less deep and loud! A tale of less affright, And tempered with delight, As Otway's self had framed the tender lay,— 'Tis of a little child Upon a lonesome wild, Nor far from home, but she hath lost her way: And now moans low in bitter grief and fear, And now screams loud, and hopes to make her mother hear. VIII 'Tis midnight, but small thoughts have I of sleep: Full seldom may my friend such vigils keep! Visit her, gentle Sleep! with wings of healing, And may this storm be but a mountain-birth, May all the stars hang bright above her dwelling, Silent as though they watched the sleeping Earth! With light heart may she rise, Gay fancy, cheerful eyes, Joy lift her spirit, joy attune her voice; To her may all things live, from pole to pole, Their life the eddying of her living soul! O simple spirit, guided from above, Dear Lady! friend devoutest of my choice, Thus mayest thou ever, evermore rejoice.

I dredge allegedly to repair and upgrade the Port of Umm Qasr I edge a legibly duty free transrational contract drag well I pledge alien lesions will be doled expensively (not on the cheap) and not to um miss explosives who shell Bechtel by the—that is Shell it by the shore Bechtel sells unflaggingly to the drag of the dividend rates of America I pluck allegiance from an estimated 1.8 billion and to the executive committee— Chicago—the world’s fair—and to Columbus Day in the park—I think it was the fourth of the reprivate which it hands to the drooling class—I mean the measuring cache watch this base—I a semifree colonist in gall— and to the elect by which it assesses, and to the electric by which it stands, and erects, th— rederegulated privates, bow, get down: how much would be chucked if this versus then forest of Arden should burn in the name of the national hamlet— if it be true that good wine needs no bush, we’d choose once we got behind the curtain, we guessed, if it’s there anymore except in Geist . . . while one gush mail addles in accidental against its—when walking Tokyo—wonderful you caming to OOIOO show & I Ill put you on the just list— this against—flurry of finger-pointing—forget it and your phony numbers like in why two okeydoke take it, one ration under planes— Apaches, syllabled to us versus shame— one galaxy under goods, world’s-without-end fair under the indivisible party, beneath security, below God’s belts to humanity, with puberty and enduring as-is and no trial for troglodytes and dogs and tax treats for by for allegiance. The friction has its machine—as you choose it?

I hear a book being written, my sister says, or is it a poem? Her eyes are closed. It has a lot of semicolons. One sentence or two? she wants to know. Comma? Period. Well, I say, semicolons join and separate. Grammar, my sister says, is very interesting.