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One has some glory—brutal and rough, a kind of encounter Fame is not pursuant The splendid enterprise, peerage, and trench— Let us consider that flourish I had a friend who gloried, this seemed invisible to some He broke apart his face, he promoted "That was abandoning reputation to cover up shame" As evening borrows its tickle from sun And from retrospect, with alarm "I don't know anyone has got clean rid of it"

There is a little lightning in his eyes. Iron at the mouth. His brows ride neither too far up nor down. He is splendid. With a place to stand. Some glowing in the common blood. Some specialness within.

For Claudio Guillén In the branches of the laurel tree I saw two dark doves One was the sun and one the moon Little neighbors I said where is my grave — In my tail said the sun On my throat said the moon And I who was walking with the land around my waist saw two snow eagles and a naked girl One was the other and the girl was none Little eagles I said where is my grave — In my tail said the sun On my throat said the moon In the branches of the laurel tree I saw two naked doves One was the other and both were none Translated from the Spanish

Wyatt resteth here, that quick could never rest; Whose heavenly gifts increased by disdain, And virtue sank the deeper in his breast; Such profit he by envy could obtain. A head where wisdom mysteries did frame, Whose hammers beat still in that lively brain As on a stithy where that some work of fame Was daily wrought, to turn to Britain's gain. A visage stern and mild, where both did grow, Vice to contemn, in virtue to rejoice; Amid great storms, whom grace assured so To live upright and smile at fortune's choice. A hand that taught what might be said in rhyme; That reft Chaucer the glory of his wit: A mark, the which (unparfited, for time) Some may approach, but never none shall hit. A tongue that served in foreign realms his king; Whose courteous talk to virtue did enflame Each noble heart; a worthy guide to bring Our English youth by travail unto fame. An eye whose judgment none affect could blind, Friends to allure, and foes to reconcile; Whose piercing look did represent a mind With virtue fraught, reposed, void of guile. A heart where dread was never so impress'd, To hide the thought that might the truth advance; In neither fortune loft, nor yet repress'd, To swell in wealth, or yield unto mischance. A valiant corps, where force and beauty met; Happy, alas, too happy, but for foes! Lived, and ran the race, that Nature set: Of manhood's shape, where she the mould did lose. But to the heavens that simple soul is fled, Which left with such as covet Christ to know Witness of faith that never shall be dead, Sent for our health, but not received so. Thus, for our guilt, this jewel have we lost; The earth his bones, the heavens possess his ghost.

If our view were not a Holiday Inn but a fringe of trees, I could say G here is our greenly hidden. If we lived amid Joe-Pye weed and high grass instead of spackle and peeling plaster I could say perhaps I’m listening to G now but mean the owl, a wind playing the silo, a sticking sorrow, any sound but the snore of our latest visitor on the futon. Dear G, please make him turn, make me kinder. I’m not far from unfathoming it all.

I was planted, a crop not a boy but with headlong technique, everything in me telling to be coursed through with water and emptiness ★ The blank was worth tending a matter of tight, small discretions separating from youth like a bee It's just silence I've been talking about Into hills I tried things I was made of What was not in my memory, not math yet patched all together I required this armor "wrestling with old champions body against body" ★ Scribbling down the solution "by little light attacks" A life is at odds and we solve it a shadow itself "Understanding makes profit of everything—arranges, acts, and reigns," gives knowledge out in a swan Virtue wasn't a mountain, not a field or was it me brooding ★ "Too ill to instruct others," this awareness of slow moving and ditch of the past of the subject A few lumps on the ground like a book "Mixing with men is wonderfully useful" but hard practice ★ "For our boy, a closet, a garden, the table and bed, solitude, company, morning and evening, all hours will be the same, all places will be his study" ★ He's in philosophy, and mingled let him forgive it I have been happy in rooms Gambling with pocket, with babble "he will not say his lesson as do it" and the unit is character, "repeated in actions" ★ Rising to beg and confounding I hear it now, in our ears

My mother's maids, when they did sew and spin, They sang sometime a song of the field mouse, That, for because her livelood was but thin, Would needs go seek her townish sister's house. She thought herself endurèd too much pain; The stormy blasts her cave so sore did souse That when the furrows swimmèd with the rain, She must lie cold and wet in sorry plight; And worse than that, bare meat there did remain To comfort her when she her house had dight; Sometime a barley corn; sometime a bean; For which she laboured hard both day and night In harvest time whilst she might go and glean; And where store was stroyèd with the flood, Then well away! for she undone was clean. Then was she fain to take instead of food Sleep, if she might, her hunger to beguile. "My sister," quod she, "hath a living good, And hence from me she dwelleth not a mile. In cold and storm she lieth warm and dry In bed of down; the dirt doth not defile Her tender foot, she laboureth not as I. Richly she feedeth and at the richman's cost, And for her meat she needs not crave nor cry. By sea, by land, of the delicates, the most Her cater seeks, and spareth for no peril. She feedeth on boiled bacon meet and roast, And hath thereof neither charge nor travail; And when she list, the liquor of the grape Doth glad her heart till that her belly swell." And at this journey she maketh but a jape; So forth she goeth, trusting of all this wealth With her sister her part so for to shape, That if she might keep herself in health, To live a lady while her life doth last. And to the door now is she come by stealth, And with her foot anon she scrapeth full fast. Th' other for fear durst not well scarce appear, Of every noise so was the wretch aghast. At last she askèd softly who was there. And in her language, as well as she could, "Peep!" quod the other. "Sister, I am here." "Peace," quod the towny mouse, "why speakest thou so loud?" And by the hand she took her fair and well. "Welcome," quod she, "my sister, by the Rood!" She feasted her, that joy it was to tell The fare they had; they drank the wine so clear, And as to purpose now and then it fell, She cheerèd her with "How, sister, what cheer!" Amids this joy befell a sorry chance, That, well away! the stranger bought full dear The fare she had, for, as she look askance, Under a stool she spied two steaming eyes In a round head with sharp ears. In France Was never mouse so fear'd, for the unwise Had not i-seen such a beast before, Yet had nature taught her after her guise To know her foe and dread him evermore. The towny mouse fled, she know whither to go; Th' other had no shift, but wonders sore Feard of her life. At home she wished her tho, And to the door, alas! as she did skip, The Heaven it would, lo! and eke her chance was so, At the threshold her silly foot did trip; And ere she might recover it again, The traitor cat had caught her by the hip, And made her there against her will remain, That had forgotten her poor surety and rest For seeming wealth wherein she thought to reign. Alas, my Poynz, how men do seek the best And find the worst, by error as they stray! And no marvail; when sight is so opprest. And blind the guide; anon out of the way Goeth guide and all in seeking quiet life. O wretched minds, there is no gold that may Grant that ye seek; no war, no peace, no strife. No, no, although thy head were hooped with gold, Sergeant with mace, hawbert, sword, nor knife, Cannot repulse the care that follow should. Each kind of life hath with him his disease. Live in delight even as thy lust would, And thou shalt find, when lust doth most thee please, It irketh straight and by itself doth fade. A small thing it is that may thy mind appease. None of ye all there is that is so mad To seek grapes upon brambles or breres; Nor none, I trow, that hath his wit so bad To set his hay for conies over rivers, Ne ye set not a drag-net for an hare; And yet the thing that most is your desire Ye do mis-seek with more travail and care. Make plain thine heart, that it be not knotted With hope or dread, and see thy will be bare From all affects, whom vice hath ever spotted. Thyself content with that is thee assigned, And use it well that is to thee allotted. Then seek no more out of thyself to find The thing that thou hast sought so long before, For thou shalt feel it sitting in thy mind. Mad, if ye list to continue your sore, Let present pass and gape on time to come, And deep yourself in travail more and more. Henceforth, my Poynz, this shall be all and some, These wretched fools shall have nought else of me; But to the great God and to his high doom, None other pain pray I for them to be, But when the rage doth lead them from the right, That, looking backward, Virtue they may see, Even as she is, so goodly fair and bright; And whilst they clasp their lusts in arms across, Grant them, good Lord, as Thou mayst of Thy might To fret inward for losing such a loss.

When the man behind the counter said, “You pay by the orifice,” what could we do but purchase them all? Ah, Sandy, you were clearly the deluxe doll, modish and pert in your plastic nurse whites, official hostess to our halcyon days, where you bobbed in the doorway of our dishabille apartment, a block downwind from the stockyards. Holding court on the corroded balcony, K. and I passed hash brownies, collecting change for the building’s monthly pool to predict which balcony would fall off next. That’s when K. was fucking M. and M. was fucking J., and even B. and I threw down once on the glass-speckled lawn, adrift in the headlights of his El Camino. Those were immortal times, Sandy! Coke wasn’t addictive yet, condoms prevented herpes and men were only a form of practice for the Russian novel we foolishly hoped our lives would become. Now it’s a Friday night, sixteen years from there. Don’t the best characters know better than to live too long? My estranged husband house-sits for a spoiled cockatoo while saving to buy his own place. My lover’s gone back to his gin and the farm-team fiancée he keeps in New York. What else to do but read Frank O’Hara to my tired three-year-old? When I put him to bed, he mutters “more sorry” as he turns into sleep. Tonight, I find you in a box I once marked “The Past.” Well, therapy’s good for some things, Sandy, but who’d want to forgive a girl like that? Frank says Destroy yourself if you don’t know! Deflated, you’re simply the smile that surrounds a hole. I don’t know anything.

(excerpt) OF THE PROGRESS OF THE SOUL Wherein, by occasion of the religious death of Mistress Elizabeth Drury, the incommodities of the soul in this her life, and her exaltation in the next, are contemplated THE SECOND ANNIVERSARY Forget this rotten world, and unto thee Let thine own times as an old story be. Be not concern'd; study not why, nor when; Do not so much as not believe a man. For though to err, be worst, to try truths forth Is far more business than this world is worth. I'he world is but a carcass; thou art fed By it, but as a worm, that carcass bred; And why shouldst thou, poor worm, consider more, When this world will grow better than before, Than those thy fellow-worms do think upon That carcass's last resurrection? Forget this world, and scarce think of it so, As of old clothes, cast off a year ago. To be thus stupid is alacrity; Men thus lethargic have best memory. Look upward; that's towards her, whose happy state We now lament not, but congratulate. She, to whom all this world was but a stage, Where all sat heark'ning how her youthful age Should be employ'd, because in all she did Some figure of the golden times was hid. Who could not lack, what'er this world could give, Because she was the form, that made it live; Nor could complain that this world was unfit To be stay'd in, then when she was in it; She, that first tried indifferent desires By virtue, and virtue by religious fires; She, to whose person paradise adher'd, As courts to princes; she, whose eyes enspher'd Star-light enough t' have made the South control, (Had she been there) the star-full Northern Pole; She, she is gone; she is gone; when thou knowest this, What fragmentary rubbish this world is Thou knowest, and that it is not worth a thought; He honours it too much that thinks it nought. Think then, my soul, that death is but a groom, Which brings a taper to the outward room, Whence thou spiest first a little glimmering light, And after brings it nearer to thy sight; For such approaches doth heaven make in death. Think thyself labouring now with broken breath, And think those broken and soft notes to be Division, and thy happiest harmony. Think thee laid on thy death-bed, loose and slack, And think that but unbinding of a pack, To take one precious thing, thy soul, from thence. Think thyself parch'd with fever's violence; Anger thine ague more, by calling it Thy physic; chide the slackness of the fit. Think that thou hear'st thy knell, and think no more, But that, as bells call'd thee to church before, So this to the Triumphant Church calls thee. Think Satan's sergeants round about thee be, And think that but for legacies they thrust; Give one thy pride, to'another give thy lust; Give them those sins which they gave thee before, And trust th' immaculate blood to wash thy score. Think thy friends weeping round, and think that they Weep but because they go not yet thy way. Think that they close thine eyes, and think in this, That they confess much in the world amiss, Who dare not trust a dead man's eye with that Which they from God and angels cover not. Think that they shroud thee up, and think from thence They reinvest thee in white innocence. Think that thy body rots, and (if so low, Thy soul exalted so, thy thoughts can go) Think thee a prince, who of themselves create Worms, which insensibly devour their state. Think that they bury thee, and think that rite Lays thee to sleep but a Saint Lucy's night.

I like to lie with you wordless on black cloud rooft beach in late june 5 o’clock tempest on clump weed bed with sand fitting your contours like tailor made and I like to wash my summer brown face in north cold hudson rapids with octagon soap knees niched in steamy rocks where last night’s frog stared at our buddhist sleep but most of all I like to see the morning happen . . . I like to go down vertical mountains where lanny goshkitch meditated crashing poplars sap sticky arms flailing as thermosed green tea anoints sneakers and blood soakt brow I taste and love myself a split second and I like to feel my own full scrotum as I horizon the whole crisp linen earth in my beatitude waiting miguel-like in maskt fantasy for christ-like you— whoever you are but most of all I like to see the morning happen . . . I like to look at books howl haikus of the seasons of the mind that I might know the knowing and the simplest to think of all of us taking turns at catching each other in the rye and I like to taste cold absinthe on hot hung sunday mornings discussing orgies symposiums and sounds with hoary headed poets in upstairs jazz club in Japan but most of all I like to see the morning happen when k and ike still sleep and only the denver night riders hum contrasts to orient jazzy feather beasts in the dewy garden of real earth where I can sink my naked feet cool