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Between the imaginary iceberg and the skeletal whale is the stuffed and mounted mermaid in her case, the crudely-stitched seam between skin and scale so unlike Herbert Draper’s siren dreams, loose on the swelling tide, part virgin and part harpy. Her post-mortem hair and her terrible face look more like P.T. Barnum’s Freak of Feejee, piscene and wordless, trapped in the net of a stare. She has the head and shrivelled tits of a monkey, the green glass eyes of a porcelain doll, a pair of praying-mantis hands, and fishy lips open to reveal her sea-caved mouth, her rare ivory mermaid-teeth. Children breathe and rap on the glass to make her move. In her fixity she’s as far as can be from the selkie who slips her wet pelt on the beaches of Orkney and walks as a woman, pupils widened in light, discarding the stuffed sack of her body. Without hearing, or touch, or taste, or smell, or sight she echoes the numb roll of the whale in a sea congealed with cold, when it was thought no beast could be a nerveless as the whale.

What is this tint that in the shrill cress Will never cease to trouble us and in the fields Gives prick and praise for Beauty? And said birds that feed on berries Are pervious—and shook the snow from his thighs. I thought of nothing carefully, but of snow, and the birds. Then kissed the cup and sipped a little Though almost choked drank slowly Tickled with strange measure She faked a pretty anger I entertained the night with fantastic, empty pleasure We went as far as the ivie-bush And ivie-crowns upon our heads And carried her kiss untouched and entire Then all was fresh, inclined To wriggle and nussle and lascivious Ardent leaps. In the thickest of the wood Bid him kiss close and often And directed him to her fancie The ground had a sweeter scent, the boughs a blush One fruit, rare and rich, would outdo many together She was wild to climb the tree Nor would she be forbidden She seized the apple and put it in her bosom.

Wedlock, as old Men note, hath likened been, Unto a publick Crowd or common Rout; Where those that are without would fain get in, And those that are within would fain get out. Grief often treads upon the Heels of Pleasure, Marry’d in Haste, we oft repent at Leisure; Some by Experience find these Words misplac’ed, Marry’d at Leisure, they repent in Haste.

To prepare the body, aim for the translucent perfection you find in the sliced shavings of a pickled turnip. In order for this to happen, you must avoid the sun, protect the face under a paper parasol until it is bruised white like the skin of lilies. Use white soap from a blue porcelain dish for this. Restrict yourself. Eat the whites of things: tender bamboo shoots, the veins of the young iris, the clouded eye of a fish. Then wrap the body, as if it were a perfumed gift, in pieces of silk held together with invisible threads like a kite, weighing no more than a handful of crushed chrysanthemums. Light enough to float in the wind. You want the effect of koi moving through water. When the light leaves the room, twist lilacs into the lacquered hair piled high like a complicated shrine. There should be tiny bells inserted somewhere in the web of hair to imitate crickets singing in a hidden grove. Reveal the nape of the neck, your beauty spot. Hold the arrangement. If your spine slacks and you feel faint, remember the hand-picked flower set in the front alcove, which, just this morning, you so skillfully wired into place. How poised it is! Petal and leaf curving like a fan, the stem snipped and wedged into the metal base— to appear like a spontaneous accident.

Hard, heavy, slow, dark, Or so I find them, the hands of Te Whaea Teaching me to die. Some lightness will come later When the heart has lost its unjust hope For special treatment. Today I go with a bucket Over the paddocks of young grass, So delicate like fronds of maidenhair, Looking for mushrooms. I find twelve of them, Most of them little, and some eaten by maggots, But they’ll do to add to the soup. It’s a long time now Since the great ikons fell down, God, Mary, home, sex, poetry, Whatever one uses as a bridge To cross the river that only has one beach, And even one’s name is a way of saying — ‘This gap inside a coat’ — the darkness I call God, The darkness I call Te Whaea, how can they translate The blue calm evening sky that plane tunnels through Like a little wasp, or the bucket in my hand, Into something else? I go on looking For mushrooms in the field, and the fist of longing Punches my heart, until it is too dark to see.

Hence vain deluding Joys, The brood of Folly without father bred, How little you bested, Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys; Dwell in some idle brain, And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess, As thick and numberless As the gay motes that people the sunbeams, Or likest hovering dreams, The fickle pensioners of Morpheus' train. But hail thou goddess, sage and holy, Hail divinest Melancholy, Whose saintly visage is too bright To hit the sense of human sight; And therefore to our weaker view, O'er-laid with black, staid Wisdom's hue; Black, but such as in esteem, Prince Memnon's sister might beseem, Or that starr'd Ethiop queen that strove To set her beauty's praise above The sea nymphs, and their powers offended. Yet thou art higher far descended, Thee bright-hair'd Vesta long of yore, To solitary Saturn bore; His daughter she (in Saturn's reign, Such mixture was not held a stain) Oft in glimmering bow'rs and glades He met her, and in secret shades Of woody Ida's inmost grove, While yet there was no fear of Jove. Come pensive nun, devout and pure, Sober, stedfast, and demure, All in a robe of darkest grain, Flowing with majestic train, And sable stole of cypress lawn, Over thy decent shoulders drawn. Come, but keep thy wonted state, With ev'n step, and musing gait, And looks commercing with the skies, Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes: There held in holy passion still, Forget thyself to marble, till With a sad leaden downward cast, Thou fix them on the earth as fast. And join with thee calm Peace, and Quiet, Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet, And hears the Muses in a ring, Aye round about Jove's altar sing. And add to these retired Leisure, That in trim gardens takes his pleasure; But first, and chiefest, with thee bring Him that yon soars on golden wing, Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne, The cherub Contemplation; And the mute Silence hist along, 'Less Philomel will deign a song, In her sweetest, saddest plight, Smoothing the rugged brow of night, While Cynthia checks her dragon yoke, Gently o'er th' accustom'd oak. Sweet bird that shunn'st the noise of folly, Most musical, most melancholy! Thee, chauntress, oft the woods among, I woo to hear thy even-song; And missing thee, I walk unseen On the dry smooth-shaven green, To behold the wand'ring Moon, Riding near her highest noon, Like one that had been led astray Through the heav'ns wide pathless way; And oft, as if her head she bow'd, Stooping through a fleecy cloud. Oft on a plat of rising ground, I hear the far-off curfew sound, Over some wide-water'd shore, Swinging slow with sullen roar; Or if the air will not permit, Some still removed place will fit, Where glowing embers through the room Teach light to counterfeit a gloom, Far from all resort of mirth, Save the cricket on the hearth, Or the bellman's drowsy charm, To bless the doors from nightly harm. Or let my lamp at midnight hour, Be seen in some high lonely tow'r, Where I may oft out-watch the Bear, With thrice great Hermes, or unsphere The spirit of Plato, to unfold What worlds, or what vast regions hold The immortal mind that hath forsook Her mansion in this fleshly nook: And of those dæmons that are found In fire, air, flood, or under ground, Whose power hath a true consent With planet, or with element. Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy In sceptr'd pall come sweeping by, Presenting Thebes', or Pelop's line, Or the tale of Troy divine, Or what (though rare) of later age, Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage. But, O sad Virgin, that thy power Might raise Musæus from his bower, Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing Such notes as, warbled to the string, Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek, And made Hell grant what love did seek. Or call up him that left half told The story of Cambuscan bold, Of Camball, and of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife, That own'd the virtuous ring and glass, And of the wond'rous horse of brass, On which the Tartar king did ride; And if aught else, great bards beside, In sage and solemn tunes have sung, Of tourneys and of trophies hung, Of forests, and enchantments drear, Where more is meant than meets the ear. Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career, Till civil-suited Morn appear, Not trick'd and frounc'd as she was wont, With the Attic boy to hunt, But kerchief'd in a comely cloud, While rocking winds are piping loud, Or usher'd with a shower still, When the gust hath blown his fill, Ending on the rustling leaves, With minute-drops from off the eaves. And when the Sun begins to fling His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring To arched walks of twilight groves, And shadows brown that Sylvan loves, Of pine, or monumental oak, Where the rude axe with heaved stroke, Was never heard the nymphs to daunt, Or fright them from their hallow'd haunt. There in close covert by some brook, Where no profaner eye may look, Hide me from Day's garish eye, While the bee with honied thigh, That at her flow'ry work doth sing, And the waters murmuring With such consort as they keep, Entice the dewy-feather'd sleep; And let some strange mysterious dream, Wave at his wings, in airy stream Of lively portraiture display'd, Softly on my eye-lids laid. And as I wake, sweet music breathe Above, about, or underneath, Sent by some spirit to mortals good, Or th' unseen Genius of the wood. But let my due feet never fail To walk the studious cloister's pale, And love the high embowed roof, With antique pillars massy proof, And storied windows richly dight, Casting a dim religious light. There let the pealing organ blow, To the full-voic'd quire below, In service high, and anthems clear, As may with sweetness, through mine ear, Dissolve me into ecstasies, And bring all Heav'n before mine eyes. And may at last my weary age Find out the peaceful hermitage, The hairy gown and mossy cell, Where I may sit and rightly spell Of every star that Heav'n doth shew, And every herb that sips the dew; Till old experience do attain To something like prophetic strain. These pleasures, Melancholy, give, And I with thee will choose to live.

Come live with me And we will sit Upon the rocks By shallow rivers Come live with me And we will plant acorns In each other's mouth It would be our way Of greeting the earth Before it shoves us Back into the snow Our interior cavities Brimming with Disagreeable substances Come live with me Before winter stops To use the only pillow The sky ever sleeps on Our interior cavities Brimming with snow Come live with me Before spring Swallows the air And birds sing

blacks painted onto bricks & split vinyl on the East Side, jaws as tight as window locks with the curtains drawn & behind that diligent fabric: blacks already tucked into homemade forts—folding chairs, wobbly backbones & the whole, snowy world waiting outside like ghost stories whispered around the last sputtering match. & later, top sheets pulled up over heads from fear of mirrors at midnight or some backfired beater’s rusty pop pop pop after the key twists at the edge of the week. No doubt: Tuesday is the scariest day in Section 8, but Friday is right after it in the suburbs. & after those trembling weekdays, even more blacks with money disappearing & reappearing as unexpectedly as poltergeists inside of TVs & haunted trees with fast fingers in West Side yards. & still not a wavelength of any kind for a black to put in the bank. The inks in everybody’s hatted & contracting checkbooks don’t change black. Some front-row architecture might. Some guns, too, & their loud, colorful opportunities: whatever version of black is inside a fist around a grip. Not a color, really—more like the face a man makes in the glinting face of a gun pointed at him every single day.

Touching your goodness, I am like a man Who turns a letter over in his hand And you might think this was because the hand Was unfamiliar but, truth is, the man Has never had a letter from anyone; And now he is both afraid of what it means And ashamed because he has no other means To find out what it says than to ask someone. His uncle could have left the farm to him, Or his parents died before he sent them word, Or the dark girl changed and want him for beloved. Afraid and letter-proud, he keeps it with him. What would you call his feeling for the words That keep him rich and orphaned and beloved?

A gold box of Latin words rests in a dazzling, fanciful field someone raised to life, lavishing flowers with untraceable roots, histories too distant to discern, upon skin-pale, palm-sized vellum. Imagine the one who did this, lost in dwindling light, a trembling flame and painstakingly lovely colors: blood red, violet, heavy yellow and fierce, unnatural green. Framed like a window to the artist's heart, the mother and child, uncomprehending men offering what they can: the infant touches a tiny, gold-leaf casket. All around him the dark, heraldic blue of angel winds, night sky, her veil. And below him, you can see the word God printed over infinitely careful erasures.