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you have to understand it was so hot sand as far as the eye could see sand in teeth a sealess life every step a sinking a scratch every storm more sand no sweat when we danced pure salt in our lovemaking i tried to spit once it came out like a whistle my first period curry powder old wives spoke of tears we thought they were senile laughter was our wettest thing we prayed often to no one we believed in music dry palms clapping dust on ankle bracelets we threw tabla and daff caught spirit and sagat a blaring life the wailing or caesarean births widows' eyes wept wind even our tongues were tanned something sun-dried in every recipe rays were babies' first words you have to understand we forgot how to be thirsty mud by then was primitive splashing the stuff of legend only giddiness quenched us we were dizzy all the time in the world all the time then we heard him grumbling to himself something about forty something about a flood clad in sheep's wool he reeked of wolf shit something about monogamy something about shelter i thought: this must be heatstroke i thought: the brain of a six-hundred-year-old i thought: he is a conceptual artist the ark an installation his masterpiece took years took trees got bigger he was our favorite dirty joke beloved schizophrenic neighbor then he started preaching then he kidnapped pigs mosquitos doves things that wanted to eat each other stuffed onto the same boat we threw our heads back we slapped ashy knees we mooned him threw hot stones we streaked whistled in his face kicked the baking ship laughter was our thunder thing the lucky ones died laughing for centuries he warned us condescending motherfucker foaming at the mouth sweat dripping from his beard condensation how did we miss it? i have no words for the first drop cooling the cheek grandfathers raised their arms lightning made the children leap sizzle gave way to drizzle humidity taught humility we opened our mouths swallowing everything the clouds begat clouds began to bite us back panic soaked our slouching spines the instruments drowned first we played them sopping out of tune denial gave way to rivers i fell into a puddle my very first shiver the shock of cold water made me orgasm so all the times before had been dry heave? so this was mourning this was mikveh? the sky from blue to za'atar hail we choked god's vomit filled our lungs apologies bellyflopped reaching went out of reach we ran from high desert to highest mountain to whirlpool or choral grief if noah had keen merciful he would have taught us how to swim instead he saved two mice muttered prayers shut the door the best belly dancers became mermaids the dinosaurs learned to fly we never saw a rainbow our grave stones coral reef

Remembering you and reviewing our structural love the past re-arises alive from its smothering dust. For memory, which is only decadent in hands like a miser’s loving the thing for its thingness, or in the eyes of collectors who assess the size, the incredible size, of their collection, can, in the living head, create and make new the sometimes appallingly ancient present and sting the sleeping thing to a sudden seeing. And as a tree with all its leaves relaxed can shiver at the memory of wind or the still waters of a pool recall their springing origin and rise and fall suddenly over the encircling basin’s lip— so I, remembering from now to then, can know and see and feel again, as jewels must when held in a brilliant branch of sun.

We drank our faces off until the sun arrived, Night after night, and most of us survived To waft outside to sunrise on Second Avenue, And felt a kind of Wordsworth wonderment—the morning new, The sidewalk fresh as morning dew—and us new, too. How wonderful to be so magnified. Every Scotch and soda had been usefully applied. You were who you weren't till now. We'd been white Harvard piglets sucking on the whisky sow And now we'd write a book, without having to know how. If you didn't get a hangover, that was one kind of bad And was a sign of something, but if you had Tranquilizers to protect yourself before you went to work, Say as a doctor interning at nearby New York Hospital, don't be a jerk, Take them, take loads of them, and share them, and don't smirk. We smoked Kools, unfiltered Camels, and papier maïs Gitanes, The fat ones Belmondo smoked in Breathless—and so did Don, Elaine's original red-haired cokehead maître d’ Who had a beautiful wife, dangerously. But stay away from the beautiful wife or else catastrophe. Many distinguished dead were there At one of the front tables, fragrant talk everywhere. Plimpton, Mailer, Styron, Bobby Short—fellows, have another drink. You had to keep drinking or you'd sink. Smoking fifty cigarettes a day made your squid-ink fingers stink. Unlucky people born with the alcoholic gene Were likely to become alcoholics. Life is mean That way, because others who drank as much or more didn't Succumb, but just kept on drinking—and didn't Do cocaine, and didn't get fucked up, and just didn't! The dead are gone— Their thousand and one nights vanished into dawn. Were they nothing but tubs of guts, suitably gowned, waiting around Till dawn turned into day?Last round! Construction of the new Second Avenue subway enters the ground. Aldrich once protested to Elaine that his bill for the night was too high. She showed him his tab was for seventeen Scotches and he started to cry. (Or was it eighteen?) We were the scene. Now the floor has been swept clean. Everyone's gone. Elaine and Elaine's have vanished into the dawn. Elaine the woman, who weighed hundreds of pounds, is floating around— Her ghost calls out:Last round! Wailing, construction of the new Second Avenue subway pounds the ground.

Even the flags seemed frozen to their poles, and the men stamping their well-shod feet resembled an army of overcoats. But we were young and fueled by hope, our ardor burned away the cold. We were the president’s, and briefly the president would be ours. The old poet stumbled over his own indelible words, his breath a wreath around his face: a kind of prophecy.

Cold in the earth—and the deep snow piled above thee, Far, far removed, cold in the dreary grave! Have I forgot, my only Love, to love thee, Severed at last by Time's all-severing wave? Now, when alone, do my thoughts no longer hover Over the mountains, on that northern shore, Resting their wings where heath and fern-leaves cover Thy noble heart forever, ever more? Cold in the earth—and fifteen wild Decembers, From those brown hills, have melted into spring: Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers After such years of change and suffering! Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee, While the world's tide is bearing me along; Other desires and other hopes beset me, Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong! No later light has lightened up my heaven, No second morn has ever shone for me; All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given, All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee. But, when the days of golden dreams had perished, And even Despair was powerless to destroy, Then did I learn how existence could be cherished, Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy. Then did I check the tears of useless passion— Weaned my young soul from yearning after thine; Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten Down to that tomb already more than mine. And, even yet, I dare not let it languish, Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain; Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish, How could I seek the empty world again?

Held in a late season At a shifting of worlds, In the golden balance of autumn, Out of love and reason We made our peace; Stood still in October In the failing light and sought, Each in the other, ease And release from silence, From the slow damnation Of speech that is weak And falls from silence. In the October sun By the green river we spoke, Late in October, the leaves Of the water maples had fallen. But whatever we said In the bright leaves was lost, Quick as the leaf-fall, Brittle and blood red. For Kenneth Rexroth, 1950

Yes, thou art gone and never more Thy sunny smile shall gladden me; But I may pass the old church door And pace the floor that covers thee; May stand upon the cold, damp stone, And think that frozen lies below The lightest heart that I have known, The kindest I shall ever know. Yet, though I cannot see thee more 'Tis still a comfort to have seen, And though thy transient life is o'er 'Tis sweet to think that thou hast been; To think a soul so near divine, Within a form so angel fair United to a heart like thine Has gladdened once our humble sphere.

For my students This is for the boys whose bedrooms are in the basement, who press creases into jeans, who carve their names in pavement, the girls whose names are ancient, ancestry is sacred, the Aztec and the Mayan gods abuela used to pray with This is for the dangerous words hiding in the pages of composition notes, holy books, and Sanskrit This is for the patients who wait for medication, for the mothers microwaving beans and rice at day’s end This is for the marching bands and girls at quinceañeras, the skaters and the writers whose moms are eloteras, laughing “Cops don’t scare us, we sag so elders fear us We will rewrite our textbooks in our own language if you dare us” This is for the Sarahs, the Angelicas, and Shawns, the Beatrices, Paolas, Danielas, and the dawns we scribble sunlight in the margins of horizons with our songs, for all the voices tangled with the silence on our tongues Rivals in the parks, fireworks at dark, tired shirts that sweat your scent on hangers in the closet For the boys who fix the faucet while their sister fixes coffee ’cause mommy had to leave for work at 6 AM and laundry isn’t folded yet: you don’t have to hold your breath You don’t have to behave: stage your own rebellion, paint canvases with rage and religion and prayers for pilgrims sleeping in the train cars at the border and their children Filibust the Senate and bust markers on the Pink Line, stain the prosecution’s case and force the judge to resign, force the crowd the rewind the lyrics you invented Speak away the limits to heights of your existence Be a witness, be a record, be a testament, a triumph Set your poems flying in the glitter of the planets Feed open mouths with truth, the truth is we are famished The Universe is starving for the symphonies you play Clarinets and thunder and the syllables you say are the instruments: you are infinite. Stretch your hands to heaven Let your throat throttle the rhythms of all your fallen brethren Your legacy is present, your history is now You are the tenth degree of sound You are the nephews of the sky You are the bass line and the hi-hat and the snare drum and the cry of red Septembers. You’re the architects of winter You are the builders of the roads that you’re told you don’t remember          You are the builders of the roads that you’re told you don’t remember       You are the builders of the roads that you’re told you don’t remember Cast poems in the river and tell them you remember Skate City Hall to splinters and tell them you remember Send diamonds to your islands and tell them you remember Find your God inside your mirror and tell Her you remember

After snowstorms my father shoveled the driveway where it lay open to a sweep of wind across a neighbor’s field, where the snow drifted half way down to the paved road, before snow-blowers, before pick-ups cruised the streets with THE BOSS lettered on red plows. He heated the flat shovel in the woodstove till the blade steamed, like Vulcan at his furnace removing the dross, then rubbed a hissing candle on the steel so the snow would slide unchecked as he made each toss. He marked blocks with the waxed blade, lifted and tossed, lifted and tossed again, squaring off against the snow.

All I could see from where I stood Was three long mountains and a wood; I turned and looked another way, And saw three islands in a bay. So with my eyes I traced the line Of the horizon, thin and fine, Straight around till I was come Back to where I'd started from; And all I saw from where I stood Was three long mountains and a wood. Over these things I could not see; These were the things that bounded me; And I could touch them with my hand, Almost, I thought, from where I stand. And all at once things seemed so small My breath came short, and scarce at all. But, sure, the sky is big, I said; Miles and miles above my head; So here upon my back I'll lie And look my fill into the sky. And so I looked, and, after all, The sky was not so very tall. The sky, I said, must somewhere stop, And—sure enough!—I see the top! The sky, I thought, is not so grand; I 'most could touch it with my hand! And reaching up my hand to try, I screamed to feel it touch the sky. I screamed, and—lo!—Infinity Came down and settled over me; Forced back my scream into my chest, Bent back my arm upon my breast, And, pressing of the Undefined The definition on my mind, Held up before my eyes a glass Through which my shrinking sight did pass Until it seemed I must behold Immensity made manifold; Whispered to me a word whose sound Deafened the air for worlds around, And brought unmuffled to my ears The gossiping of friendly spheres, The creaking of the tented sky, The ticking of Eternity. I saw and heard, and knew at last The How and Why of all things, past, And present, and forevermore. The Universe, cleft to the core, Lay open to my probing sense That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence But could not,—nay! But needs must suck At the great wound, and could not pluck My lips away till I had drawn All venom out.—Ah, fearful pawn! For my omniscience paid I toll In infinite remorse of soul. All sin was of my sinning, all Atoning mine, and mine the gall Of all regret. Mine was the weight Of every brooded wrong, the hate That stood behind each envious thrust, Mine every greed, mine every lust. And all the while for every grief, Each suffering, I craved relief With individual desire,— Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire About a thousand people crawl; Perished with each,—then mourned for all! A man was starving in Capri; He moved his eyes and looked at me; I felt his gaze, I heard his moan, And knew his hunger as my own. I saw at sea a great fog bank Between two ships that struck and sank; A thousand screams the heavens smote; And every scream tore through my throat. No hurt I did not feel, no death That was not mine; mine each last breath That, crying, met an answering cry From the compassion that was I. All suffering mine, and mine its rod; Mine, pity like the pity of God. Ah, awful weight! Infinity Pressed down upon the finite Me! My anguished spirit, like a bird, Beating against my lips I heard; Yet lay the weight so close about There was no room for it without. And so beneath the weight lay I And suffered death, but could not die. Long had I lain thus, craving death, When quietly the earth beneath Gave way, and inch by inch, so great At last had grown the crushing weight, Into the earth I sank till I Full six feet under ground did lie, And sank no more,—there is no weight Can follow here, however great. From off my breast I felt it roll, And as it went my tortured soul Burst forth and fled in such a gust That all about me swirled the dust. Deep in the earth I rested now; Cool is its hand upon the brow And soft its breast beneath the head Of one who is so gladly dead. And all at once, and over all The pitying rain began to fall; I lay and heard each pattering hoof Upon my lowly, thatched roof, And seemed to love the sound far more Than ever I had done before. For rain it hath a friendly sound To one who's six feet underground; And scarce the friendly voice or face: A grave is such a quiet place. The rain, I said, is kind to come And speak to me in my new home. I would I were alive again To kiss the fingers of the rain, To drink into my eyes the shine Of every slanting silver line, To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze From drenched and dripping apple-trees. For soon the shower will be done, And then the broad face of the sun Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth Until the world with answering mirth Shakes joyously, and each round drop Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top. How can I bear it; buried here, While overhead the sky grows clear And blue again after the storm? O, multi-colored, multiform, Beloved beauty over me, That I shall never, never see Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold, That I shall never more behold! Sleeping your myriad magics through, Close-sepulchred away from you! O God, I cried, give me new birth, And put me back upon the earth! Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd And let the heavy rain, down-poured In one big torrent, set me free, Washing my grave away from me! I ceased; and through the breathless hush That answered me, the far-off rush Of herald wings came whispering Like music down the vibrant string Of my ascending prayer, and—crash! Before the wild wind's whistling lash The startled storm-clouds reared on high And plunged in terror down the sky, And the big rain in one black wave Fell from the sky and struck my grave. I know not how such things can be; I only know there came to me A fragrance such as never clings To aught save happy living things; A sound as of some joyous elf Singing sweet songs to please himself, And, through and over everything, A sense of glad awakening. The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear, Whispering to me I could hear; I felt the rain's cool finger-tips Brushed tenderly across my lips, Laid gently on my sealed sight, And all at once the heavy night Fell from my eyes and I could see,— A drenched and dripping apple-tree, A last long line of silver rain, A sky grown clear and blue again. And as I looked a quickening gust Of wind blew up to me and thrust Into my face a miracle Of orchard-breath, and with the smell,— I know not how such things can be!— I breathed my soul back into me. Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I And hailed the earth with such a cry As is not heard save from a man Who has been dead, and lives again. About the trees my arms I wound; Like one gone mad I hugged the ground; I raised my quivering arms on high; I laughed and laughed into the sky, Till at my throat a strangling sob Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb Sent instant tears into my eyes; O God, I cried, no dark disguise Can e'er hereafter hide from me Thy radiant identity! Thou canst not move across the grass But my quick eyes will see Thee pass, Nor speak, however silently, But my hushed voice will answer Thee. I know the path that tells Thy way Through the cool eve of every day; God, I can push the grass apart And lay my finger on Thy heart! The world stands out on either side No wider than the heart is wide; Above the world is stretched the sky,— No higher than the soul is high. The heart can push the sea and land Farther away on either hand; The soul can split the sky in two, And let the face of God shine through. But East and West will pinch the heart That can not keep them pushed apart; And he whose soul is flat—the sky Will cave in on him by and by.