1269 Arts and sciences poems

Between my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests; snug as a gun. Under my window, a clean rasping sound When the spade sinks into gravelly ground: My father, digging. I look down Till his straining rump among the flowerbeds Bends low, comes up twenty years away Stooping in rhythm through potato drills Where he was digging. The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft Against the inside knee was levered firmly. He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep To scatter new potatoes that we picked, Loving their cool hardness in our hands. By God, the old man could handle a spade. Just like his old man. My grandfather cut more turf in a day Than any other man on Toner’s bog. Once I carried him milk in a bottle Corked sloppily with paper. He straightened up To drink it, then fell to right away Nicking and slicing neatly, heaving sods Over his shoulder, going down and down For the good turf. Digging. The cold smell of potato mould, the squelch and slap Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edge Through living roots awaken in my head. But I’ve no spade to follow men like them. Between my finger and my thumb The squat pen rests. I’ll dig with it.

Peter Ciccariello provides an interesting dilemma to readers of his work. His process usually begins with the writing of a standard lineated poem, but he takes the text of that poem and wraps it around the landforms and ruins of an invented realm that he creates through meticulous computer modeling. The results are stunning and enigmatic textscapes that a reader must sift through carefully to imagine what they originally were and what they originally communicated.—Geof Huth More About Visual Poetry >>

With focus sharp as Flemish-painted face In film of varnish brightly fixed And through a polished hand-lens deeply seen, Sunday at noon through hyaline thin air Sees down the street, And in the camera of my eye depicts Row-houses and row-lives: Glass after glass, door after door the same, Face after face the same, the same, The brutal visibility the same; As if one life emerging from one house Would pause, a single image caught between Two facing mirrors where vision multiplies Beyond perspective, A silent clatter in the high-speed eye Spinning out photo-circulars of sight. I see slip to the curb the long machines Out of whose warm and windowed rooms pirouette Shellacked with silk and light The hard legs of our women. Our women are one woman, dressed in black. The carmine printed mouth And cheeks as soft as muslin-glass belong Outright to one dark dressy man, Merely a swagger at her curvy side. This is their visit to themselves: All day from porch to porch they weave A nonsense pattern through the even glare, Stealing in surfaces Cold vulgar glances at themselves. And high up in the heated room all day I wait behind the plate glass pane for one, Hot as a voyeur for a glimpse of one, The vision to blot out this woman’s sheen; All day my sight records expensively Row-houses and row-lives. But nothing happens; no diagonal With melting shadow falls across the curb: Neither the blinded negress lurching through fatigue, Nor exiles bleeding from their pores, Nor that bright bomb slipped lightly from its rack To splinter every silvered glass and crystal prism, Witch-bowl and perfume bottle And billion candle-power dressing-bulb, No direct hit to smash the shatter-proof And lodge at last the quivering needle Clean in the eye of one who stands transfixed In fascination of her brightness.

for John Godfrey 1. Animals Carved—indicated, actually, from solid Blocks of wood, the copper-, cream-, and chocolate-colored Cows we bought in Salzburg form a tiny herd. And in Dr. Gachet’s etching, six Or seven universal poses are assumed by cats. Misery, hypocrisy, greed: A dying Mouse, a cat, and a flock of puzzled blackbirds wearing Uniforms and frock coats exhibit these traits. Formally outlasting the motive Of their creation with a poetry at once too vague And too precise to do anything with but Worship, they seem to have just blundered into our lives By accident, completely comprehending Everything we find so disturbing About them; but they never speak. They never even move From the positions in which Grandville or some Anonymous movie-poster artist has left them, A sort of ghostly wolf, a lizard, an ape And a huge dog. And their eyes, looking At nothing, manage to see everything invisible To ours, even with all the time in the world To see everything we think we have to see. And tell Of this in the only way we really can: With a remark as mild as the air In which it is to be left hanging; or a stiff scream, Folded like a sheet of paper over all The horrible memories of everything we were Going to have. That vanished before our eyes As we woke up to nothing but these, Our words, poor animals whose home is in another world. 2. Summer Home Tiny outbursts of sunlight play On the tips of waves that look like tacks Strewn on the surface of the bay. Up the coast the water backs up Behind a lofty, wooded island. Here, According to photographs, it is less Turbulent and blue; but much clearer. It seems to exercise the sunlight less Reflecting it, allowing beaten silver sheets To roam like water across a kitchen floor. Having begun gradually, the gravel beach Ends abruptly in the forest on the shore. Looked at from a distance, the forest seems Haunted. But safe within its narrow room Its light is innocent and green, as though Emerging from another dream of diminution We found ourselves of normal, human size, Attempting to touch the leaves above our heads. Why couldn’t we have spent our summers here, Surrounded and growing up again? Or perhaps Arrive here late at night by car, much later In life? If only heaven were not too near For such sadness. And not within this world Which heaven has finally made clear. Green lichen fastened to a blue rock Like a map of the spot; cobwebs crowded with stars Of water; battalions of small white flowers. Such clarity, unrelieved except by our Delight and daily acquiescence in it, Presumably the effect of a natural setting Like this one, with all its expectations of ecstasy And peace, demands a future of forgetting Everything that sustains it: the dead leaves Of winter; the new leaves of spring which summer burns Into different kinds of happiness; for these, When autumn drops its tear upon them, turn. 3. Domes “Pleased in proportion to the truth Depicted by means of familiar images.” That One was dazed; the other I left in a forest Surrounded by giant, sobering pines. For I had to abandon those lives. Their burden of living had become Mine and it was like dying: alone, Huddled under the cold blue dome of the stars, Still fighting what died and so close to myself I could not even see. I kept trying to look at myself. It was like looking into the sun and I went blind. O, to break open that inert light Like a stone and let the vision slowly sink down Into the texture of things, like a comb flowing through dark, Heavy hair; and to continue to be affected much later. I was getting so tired of that excuse: refusing love Until it might become so closely mated to its birth in Acts and words of love; until a soft monstrosity of song Might fuse these moments of affection with a dream of home; The cold, prolonged proximity of God long after night Has come and only starlight trickles through the dome; And yet I only wanted to be happy. I wanted rest and innocence; a place Where I could hide each secret fear by blessing it, By letting it survive inside those faces I could never understand, Love, or bear to leave. Because I wanted peace, bruised with prayer I tried to crawl inside the heavy, slaughtered hands of love And never move. And then I felt the wound unfold inside me Like a stab of paradise: explode: and then at last Exhausted, heal into pain. And that was happiness: A dream whose ending never ends, a vein Of blood, a hollow entity Consumed by consummation, bleeding so. In the sky our eyes ascend to as they sweep Upwards into emptiness, the angels sing their listless Lullabies and children wake up glistening with screams They left asleep; and the dead are dead. The wounded worship death And live a little while in love; and then are gone. Inside the dome the stars assume the outlines of their lives: Until we know, until we come to recognize as ours, Those other lives that live within us as our own.

Difficile est proprie communia dicere HOR. Epist. ad Pison I Bob Southey! You're a poet—Poet-laureate, And representative of all the race; Although 'tis true that you turn'd out a Tory at Last—yours has lately been a common case; And now, my Epic Renegade! what are ye at? With all the Lakers, in and out of place? A nest of tuneful persons, to my eye Like "four and twenty Blackbirds in a pye; II "Which pye being open'd they began to sing" (This old song and new simile holds good), "A dainty dish to set before the King," Or Regent, who admires such kind of food; And Coleridge, too, has lately taken wing, But like a hawk encumber'd with his hood, Explaining Metaphysics to the nation— I wish he would explain his Explanation. III You, Bob! are rather insolent, you know, At being disappointed in your wish To supersede all warblers here below, And be the only Blackbird in the dish; And then you overstrain yourself, or so, And tumble downward like the flying fish Gasping on deck, because you soar too high, Bob, And fall, for lack of moisture quite a-dry, Bob! IV And Wordsworth, in a rather long "Excursion" (I think the quarto holds five hundred pages), Has given a sample from the vasty version Of his new system to perplex the sages; 'Tis poetry—at least by his assertion, And may appear so when the dog-star rages— And he who understands it would be able To add a story to the Tower of Babel. V You—Gentlemen! by dint of long seclusion From better company, have kept your own At Keswick, and, through still continu'd fusion Of one another's minds, at last have grown To deem as a most logical conclusion, That Poesy has wreaths for you alone: There is a narrowness in such a notion, Which makes me wish you'd change your lakes for Ocean. VI I would not imitate the petty thought, Nor coin my self-love to so base a vice, For all the glory your conversion brought, Since gold alone should not have been its price. You have your salary; was't for that you wrought? And Wordsworth has his place in the Excise. You're shabby fellows—true—but poets still, And duly seated on the Immortal Hill. VII Your bays may hide the baldness of your brows— Perhaps some virtuous blushes—let them go— To you I envy neither fruit nor boughs— And for the fame you would engross below, The field is universal, and allows Scope to all such as feel the inherent glow: Scott, Rogers, Campbell, Moore and Crabbe, will try 'Gainst you the question with posterity. VIII For me, who, wandering with pedestrian Muses, Contend not with you on the winged steed, I wish your fate may yield ye, when she chooses, The fame you envy, and the skill you need; And, recollect, a poet nothing loses In giving to his brethren their full meed Of merit, and complaint of present days Is not the certain path to future praise. IX He that reserves his laurels for posterity (Who does not often claim the bright reversion) Has generally no great crop to spare it, he Being only injur'd by his own assertion; And although here and there some glorious rarity Arise like Titan from the sea's immersion, The major part of such appellants go To—God knows where—for no one else can know. X If, fallen in evil days on evil tongues, Milton appeal'd to the Avenger, Time, If Time, the Avenger, execrates his wrongs, And makes the word "Miltonic" mean "sublime," He deign'd not to belie his soul in songs, Nor turn his very talent to a crime; He did not loathe the Sire to laud the Son, But clos'd the tyrant-hater he begun. XI Think'st thou, could he—the blind Old Man—arise Like Samuel from the grave, to freeze once more The blood of monarchs with his prophecies Or be alive again—again all hoar With time and trials, and those helpless eyes, And heartless daughters—worn—and pale—and poor; Would he adore a sultan?he obey The intellectual eunuch Castlereagh? XII Cold-blooded, smooth-fac'd, placid miscreant! Dabbling its sleek young hands in Erin's gore, And thus for wider carnage taught to pant, Transferr'd to gorge upon a sister shore, The vulgarest tool that Tyranny could want, With just enough of talent, and no more, To lengthen fetters by another fix'd, And offer poison long already mix'd. XIII An orator of such set trash of phrase Ineffably—legitimately vile, That even its grossest flatterers dare not praise, Nor foes—all nations—condescend to smile, Not even a sprightly blunder's spark can blaze From that Ixion grindstone's ceaseless toil, That turns and turns to give the world a notion Of endless torments and perpetual motion. XIV A bungler even in its disgusting trade, And botching, patching, leaving still behind Something of which its masters are afraid, States to be curb'd, and thoughts to be confin'd, Conspiracy or Congress to be made— Cobbling at manacles for all mankind— A tinkering slave-maker, who mends old chains, With God and Man's abhorrence for its gains. XV If we may judge of matter by the mind, Emasculated to the marrow It Hath but two objects, how to serve, and bind, Deeming the chain it wears even men may fit, Eutropius of its many masters, blind To worth as freedom, wisdom as to Wit, Fearless—because no feeling dwells in ice, Its very courage stagnates to a vice. XVI Where shall I turn me not to view its bonds, For I will never feel them?—Italy! Thy late reviving Roman soul desponds Beneath the lie this State-thing breath'd o'er thee— Thy clanking chain, and Erin's yet green wounds, Have voices—tongues to cry aloud for me. Europe has slaves—allies—kings—armies still, And Southey lives to sing them very ill. XVII Meantime—Sir Laureate—I proceed to dedicate, In honest simple verse, this song to you, And, if in flattering strains I do not predicate, 'Tis that I still retain my "buff and blue"; My politics as yet are all to educate: Apostasy's so fashionable, too, To keep one creed's a task grown quite Herculean; Is it not so, my Tory, ultra-Julian?

Don’t let that horse eat that violin cried Chagall’s mother But he kept right on painting And became famous And kept on painting The Horse With Violin In Mouth And when he finally finished it he jumped up upon the horse and rode away waving the violin And then with a low bow gave it to the first naked nude he ran across And there were no strings attached

Take any desired height, or place points for top of head and heels. Divide into eights. . . . 8.  Head tilted back between the headboard slats. Eyes glass boxes filling up with light. Later, drained to a blue-gray, the color of good government. 7.  Thus, we see that commodification is a function of local necessity. a.  As Angelenos collect percolating shade in shallow pans, to leach the arsenic out of the light. b.  “And then I buried it.” “Where, exactly? And when?” “In the chest. Insertion point at the base of the throat. You were still asleep.” “But what is it, exactly? I mean, I can’t figure out its precise extent. I mean, I can feel it there sometimes, like stitches, or sometimes like a flanged or branching bone.” 6.  Cross-hatchings of street noise and the Minotaur with his boy’s body. Narrowing. Rib cage the verge of a canoe. Armpit a whiff of pencil lead. 5.  “If you want to fuck me with that bottle, Mr. Arbuckle, best take the foil off first.” 4.osculation: a.  The act of kissing. A kiss. b.Math. A point where two branches of a curve have a common tangent and extend in both directions of the tangent. c.  To the ankles. Or to the knees. Or just unzipped enough. 3.  Charmeuse chemise. A shuddering fall. Miss Adelaide Hall on the chaise longue singing I ain’t much caring / Just where I willend. Then jerked upright, skirt hiked to the knee, that bridge stretching out under every skip-step. Slaphappy scat-puppet of the fixed smile, the meanwhile,Ain’t got nobody to love now. 2.  The bone begging bowl. The foot that pushed it away. 1.  “I want to leave you exactly as I found you.”

People traveled from miles away to see my paintings of fish— the jeweled armor of their scales, the beadlike set of their eyes in rubbery socket rings, the glimmering swish of fin and tail so real it seemed that you could almost dip a net deep into the paper and pull up the arching wet weight of a golden carp, a shiny trout, or the dark muscular heft of a bass with its mouth stretched into the surprised, wiry “oh” of a child’s wind sock. I captured my models from the sea, lake, and goldfish pond in the back garden, so careful not to let their mouths be torn by the hook, their scales chipped, or the silky tissue of their tails ripped by a clumsy hand. I kept them in large glass bowls, fed them mosquito wings or dry silkworm pupas offered from chopsticks, and when I was finished making sketches, I quickly took them back and set them free again. Every night I dream I swim with these fish as a golden carp—black spots on cloisonné scales, pulled to the surface by the deceptive creamy luster of the moon or the sizzle of firefly lights across the water. And every night I am tempted once again by the smell of the baited hook, by my predictable hunger for earthly things, and each time I am surprised again by the stinging hook in my lip that pulls me mercilessly into the bright air, setting my gills on fire, the sharp, silver pain of the knife that slits me open so easily from tail to throat to reveal the scarlet elastic of my raw gills, the translucent film of my air sac, the milky rise of my stomach, and the gray marbled coil of my intestines. I rise late each day, and work in brighter light. When I die, I will have my paintings brought down to the lake and slipped into the water. First the edges of ink will blur, and then there will be a great flurry as the fins, tails, and bodies begin blossoming in- to life again, each fish detaching from its canvas of silk or rice paper—a swirl of color, motion, swimming away.

In prayer: quiet opening, my artery is a thin shadow on paper— margin of long grass, ruderal hair, sister to this not yet part of our bodies your lyric corpus of seed in rough drafts of pine ash, chaogao or grass calligraphy in rough drafts of pine ash— your lyric corpus of seed not yet part of our bodies: ruderal hair, sister to this margin of long grass, shadow on paper, my artery is a thin quiet opening in prayer.

All night an accelerating geometry of eyes—hundreds shaped like birds or boats or beetles, simplified to dots or crosses or a pair of 2s or mis- matched diamonds, perfect zeros, scoops of moon placed sidewise or lengthwise on a face, slipping out of orbit on a cheek, hung under an ear, planted mid-forehead, paper-thin planes of them, each one alive and staring from the dislocated faces of wives, lovers, mothers, serene and lopsided, splintered, wrenching, ravaged, a proliferating gallery of women, terraced in my head as I sleep, and my own curious eye: steering toward what it perceives, capturing exact duplicates of each stylized eye I run by, as I race to comprehend what I'm taking in, what expression I'd see if I raised the mirror to find my own eye, distorted and floating above an iron cheek.