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she at last had permission to use the marble bath for the marble bath she untied a paper bag of periwinkle bath salts & flicked them into the water as though cracking a whip she untied her hair she untidied her hair tested the water with the soft pads of her toes (tips of bladder wrack in the sun) her skin her markings (as for the bath) — interior-of-Stilton at last underwater she drew breath from every shell collected from every beach later in the evening when dressed for bed she rejoined her brothers & sister & they were each served a portion of the last portion

Does she love you?She says yes, but really how do you know unless you undress that easy assertion, undoing its petals and laminae, and going in below all trace of consciousness, into the neuroelectrical coffer where self-understanding is storaged away, and then lifting its uttermost molecule out, to study in its nakedness as it spins in a clinical light?—the way we all, in our various individual versions of this common human urge, go in, and in, and in, the physicist down to the string-vibration underlying matter, and the Appalachia fiddler getting so (as she puts it) “into my music,” sound becomes a flesh for her to intimately (“in”-timately) enter, “its thick and its sweetbreads.” Is he cheating on you?He says no, and feigns that he’s insulted, but for certainty you’ll need to delicately strip the bark away and drill, and tweeze, until you can smear a microscope slide of the pith and can augur the chitterlings —the way the philosopher can’t accept a surface assumption of truth, but needs to peel back the fatty sheen of the dermis, soak the cambium layer into a blow-away foam, and then with pick and lightbeam helmet, inch by inch begin spelunking through those splayed-out caverns under the crust, where gems of cogitation are buried —the way the diver descends for the pearl, the miner: in, the archaeologist: in, the therapist: down the snakier roots of us and in, and in, the way the lone, leg-pretzeled yogi makes a glowing bathysphere of worldliness and sends it in, and further in, tinier and heavier and ever in, the way the man in the opium den is floating forever, toward a horizon positioned in the center of the center of his head. . . . If we could stand beyond the border of our species and consider us objectively, it might seem that our purpose in existing is to be a living agency that balances, or maybe even slows, the universe’s irreversible expansion out, and out . . . and each of us, a contribution to that task. My friend John’s wife received the news: a “growth,” a “mass,” on her pituitary, marble-sized, mysterious. And the primary-care physician said: Yes, we must go in and in.That couldn’t be the final word! And the second-opinion physician said: Yes, my sweet-and-shivering-one, my fingerprint-and-irisprint-uniqueness, someone’s-dearest, you who said the prayers at Juliette’s grave, who drove all night from Switzerland with your daughter, you on this irreplaceable day in your irreplaceable skin in the scumbled light as it crosses the bay in Corpus Christi, yes in the shadows, yes in the radiance, yes we must go in and in.

not to be in love with you I can’t remember what it was like it must’ve been lousy James Schuyler You take off your black motorcycle jacket, hang it on the back of a chair. It’s cold from our walk along the sea wall. Your pockets jingle with shells. While we were gone, you left the stove on low—some things you do make me so nervous. You graze the surface of sauce simmering in a pan, shiny fingertip held out for me to lick, you say “What does it need?” Maybe nothing, maybe honey to unbitter the lime. Later that night you’ll bury your face in my belly and sob. “I’m sorry,” though I don’t think you are always talking to me, my love. But now lobster steam billows up the window, you gulp purple wine, your pinky sticking out, and the round olives are the green all green things aspire to be.

Sky a shook poncho. Roof   wrung. Mind a luna moth Caught in a banjo. This weather’s witty Peek-a-boo. A study in Insincerity. Blues! Blooms! The yodel Of   the chimney in night wind. That flat daffodil. With absurd hauteur New tulips dab their shadows In water-mutter. Boys are such oxen. Girls! — sepal-shudder, shadow- Waver. Equinox. Plums on the Quad did Blossom all at once, taking Down the power grid.

Lesson of the day: Syria and Styria. For Syria, read:His conquering banner shook from Syria. And for Styria: Look at this harp of  blood, mapping. Now I am tuned. I am going to go above my voice for the sake of the forest shaken on the bitumen. You can see stars in the skulls, winking, synapses, intermittent, on edge of shriek — perhaps a cluster of fir, birches? — Anyways. Don’t get too hung up on the terms; they have entropy in common, bad for the public weal, those obtuse centurions in the flare of the bougainvillea, their patent-seeking gift kindled. Divers speech. Cruelty. Justice. Never mind, but do pay attention to the skirmish — the white panther that flitters up the pole — its shade grows large on the ground.

I Ere frost-flower and snow-blossom faded and fell, and the splendour of winter had passed out of sight, The ways of the woodlands were fairer and stranger than dreams that fulfil us in sleep with delight; The breath of the mouths of the winds had hardened on tree-tops and branches that glittered and swayed Such wonders and glories of blossomlike snow or of frost that outlightens all flowers till it fade That the sea was not lovelier than here was the land, nor the night than the day, nor the day than the night, Nor the winter sublimer with storm than the spring: such mirth had the madness and might in thee made, March, master of winds, bright minstrel and marshal of storms that enkindle the season they smite. II And now that the rage of thy rapture is satiate with revel and ravin and spoil of the snow, And the branches it brightened are broken, and shattered the tree-tops that only thy wrath could lay low, How should not thy lovers rejoice in thee, leader and lord of the year that exults to be born So strong in thy strength and so glad of thy gladness whose laughter puts winter and sorrow to scorn? Thou hast shaken the snows from thy wings, and the frost on thy forehead is molten: thy lips are aglow As a lover's that kindle with kissing, and earth, with her raiment and tresses yet wasted and torn, Takes breath as she smiles in the grasp of thy passion to feel through her spirit the sense of thee flow. III Fain, fain would we see but again for an hour what the wind and the sun have dispelled and consumed, Those full deep swan-soft feathers of snow with whose luminous burden the branches implumed Hung heavily, curved as a half-bent bow, and fledged not as birds are, but petalled as flowers, Each tree-top and branchlet a pinnacle jewelled and carved, or a fountain that shines as it showers, But fixed as a fountain is fixed not, and wrought not to last till by time or by tempest entombed, As a pinnacle carven and gilded of men: for the date of its doom is no more than an hour's, One hour of the sun's when the warm wind wakes him to wither the snow-flowers that froze as they bloomed. IV As the sunshine quenches the snowshine; as April subdues thee, and yields up his kingdom to May; So time overcomes the regret that is born of delight as it passes in passion away, And leaves but a dream for desire to rejoice in or mourn for with tears or thanksgivings; but thou, Bright god that art gone from us, maddest and gladdest of months, to what goal hast thou gone from us now? For somewhere surely the storm of thy laughter that lightens, the beat of thy wings that play, Must flame as a fire through the world, and the heavens that we know not rejoice in thee: surely thy brow Hath lost not its radiance of empire, thy spirit the joy that impelled it on quest as for prey. V Are thy feet on the ways of the limitless waters, thy wings on the winds of the waste north sea? Are the fires of the false north dawn over heavens where summer is stormful and strong like thee Now bright in the sight of thine eyes? are the bastions of icebergs assailed by the blast of thy breath? Is it March with the wild north world when April is waning? the word that the changed year saith, Is it echoed to northward with rapture of passion reiterate from spirits triumphant as we Whose hearts were uplift at the blast of thy clarions as men's rearisen from a sleep that was death And kindled to life that was one with the world's and with thine? hast thou set not the whole world free? VI For the breath of thy lips is freedom, and freedom's the sense of thy spirit, the sound of thy song, Glad god of the north-east wind, whose heart is as high as the hands of thy kingdom are strong, Thy kingdom whose empire is terror and joy, twin-featured and fruitful of births divine, Days lit with the flame of the lamps of the flowers, and nights that are drunken with dew for wine, And sleep not for joy of the stars that deepen and quicken, a denser and fierier throng, And the world that thy breath bade whiten and tremble rejoices at heart as they strengthen and shine, And earth gives thanks for the glory bequeathed her, and knows of thy reign that it wrought not wrong. VII Thy spirit is quenched not, albeit we behold not thy face in the crown of the steep sky's arch, And the bold first buds of the whin wax golden, and witness arise of the thorn and the larch: Wild April, enkindled to laughter and storm by the kiss of the wildest of winds that blow, Calls loud on his brother for witness; his hands that were laden with blossom are sprinkled with snow, And his lips breathe winter, and laugh, and relent; and the live woods feel not the frost's flame parch; For the flame of the spring that consumes not but quickens is felt at the heart of the forest aglow, And the sparks that enkindled and fed it were strewn from the hands of the gods of the winds of March.

A march in the ranks hard-prest, and the road unknown, A route through a heavy wood with muffled steps in the darkness, Our army foil’d with loss severe, and the sullen remnant retreating, Till after midnight glimmer upon us the lights of a dim-lighted building, We come to an open space in the woods, and halt by the dim-lighted building, ’Tis a large old church at the crossing roads, now an impromptu hospital Entering but for a minute I see a sight beyond all the pictures and poems ever made, Shadows of deepest, deepest black, just lit by moving candles and lamps, And by one great pitchy torch stationary with wild red flame and clouds of smoke, By these, crowds, groups of forms vaguely I see on the floor, some in the pews laid down, At my feet more distinctly a soldier, a mere lad, in danger of bleeding to death, (he is shot in the abdomen,) I stanch the blood temporarily, (the youngster’s face is white as a lily,) Then before I depart I sweep my eyes o’er the scene fain to absorb it all, Faces, varieties, postures beyond description, most in obscurity, some of them dead, Surgeons operating, attendants holding lights, the smell of ether, the odor of blood, The crowd, O the crowd of the bloody forms, the yard outside also fill’d, Some on the bare ground, some on planks or stretchers, some in the death-spasm sweating, An occasional scream or cry, the doctor’s shouted orders or calls, The glisten of the little steel instruments catching the glint of the torches, These I resume as I chant, I see again the forms, I smell the odor, Then hear outside the orders given, Fall in, my men, fall in; But first I bend to the dying lad, his eyes open, a half-smile gives he me, Then the eyes close, calmly close, and I speed forth to the darkness, Resuming, marching, ever in darkness marching, on in the ranks, The unknown road still marching.

Did all the lets and bars appear To every just or larger end, Whence should come the trust and cheer? Youth must its ignorant impulse lend— Age finds place in the rear. All wars are boyish, and are fought by boys, The champions and enthusiasts of the state: Turbid ardors and vain joys Not barrenly abate— Stimulants to the power mature, Preparatives of fate. Who here forecasteth the event? What heart but spurns at precedent And warnings of the wise, Contemned foreclosures of surprise? The banners play, the bugles call, The air is blue and prodigal. No berrying party, pleasure-wooed, No picnic party in the May, Ever went less loth than they Into that leafy neighborhood. In Bacchic glee they file toward Fate, Moloch’s uninitiate; Expectancy, and glad surmise Of battle’s unknown mysteries. All they feel is this: ’tis glory, A rapture sharp, though transitory, Yet lasting in belaureled story. So they gayly go to fight, Chatting left and laughing right. But some who this blithe mood present, As on in lightsome files they fare, Shall die experienced ere three days be spent— Perish, enlightened by the vollied glare; Or shame survive, and, like to adamant, Thy after shock, Manassas, share.

The sight of beauty simply makes us sick: There are too many hours in the day, Too many wicked faces built like flowers And far too many bargains for a song. Jade and paste, cashmere and ormolu— Who said that all the arts aspire to music? It’s obvious, for time is obvious, That all that art aspires to is junk. Blackmailed by these mathoms of the past, One is indebted for another perspective To quaint giraffes and quainter wallabies, The nearly human and the faintly monstrous, The outrageously contemporary joke. Trespassing on a no man’s territory, Unlike the moralist one is at a loss Where to be human is not to be at home. In a zoo, you see, one can acquire nothing: Zebras aren’t wishes. Nor is the flea market Exactly the place for those who know what they want. Like far out stations on the Metro (which they are) Somewhere, in heaven perhaps, they correspond, In the heaven of open arms and unpaid bills, Where beer is drunk on the lawn all afternoon And every night we bid, and make, a slam.

At dawn I heard among bird calls the billions of marching feet in the churn and squeak of gravel, even tiny feet still wet from the mother's amniotic fluid, and very old halting feet, the feet of the very light and very heavy, all marching but not together, criss-crossing at every angle with sincere attempts not to touch, not to bump into each other, walking in the doors of houses and out the back door forty years later, finally knowing that time collapses on a single plateau where they were all their lives, knowing that time stops when the heart stops as they walk off the earth into the night air.