Category: Poetry
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After “Vor dem Gesetz,” At Home, Oct ’20
He was sat in an obscure corner of the world, In Memphis (of late), and left alone to read Obscure histories, of the fishing of sea-bream, And grouper, of the proper ecological relations, Of sponge, tortoise, and the sunlight which scatters Thru the unlanc’d emeraldry of sea-skin, Their holy bilayer. This curriculum Like most, went…
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Sharing some John Ashbery, and Poetry in California
Wanted to pass along some beloved excerpts from John Ashbery, who I try my utmost to imitate. Nothing is like his poetry. An immodest little white wine, some scattered seraphs,recollections of the Fall—tell me,has anyone made a spongier representation, chasedfewer demons out of the parking lotwhere we all held hands? Little by little the idea…
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Predestination, Home, Aug ’20
There are no mountains On the sky-rim here, no. Not much offered to the gauzy eye, Squat and squinting, On the lookout for orogenies And irruptions. It’s a flat place. For the Puritans, the most attractive features of this, The nearer coast, was respite, a chance to get away from it all, Arable land less…
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The Bug’s Birth, Outside, Jun ’20
I sneezed, and there came to be a honeybee Lying on the turf. Writhing, writhing amid its stalks, His arms catching for some fast, that his wings Might underfoot take air, and him deliver Anon to higher ground. The ejecta previously mine, now his and the earth’s, Strung itself along a glimmer, and waited. I…
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Acts of Union, Nighttime, Jun ’20
Betty, who with her Scotch tongue New stews could set to boil ladleless, Sat inhomogenously upon the bus seat. Yes, Friend, inhomogeneous – for within her made rent The hoary statistic of gaseous state and without, On her visage, ruled well-traveled liquid, Fit to meet whose nature it and she chanced Upon the highway. Remaining,…
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Concerto for Woodwinds, Home, Jun ’20
Do the rest of them wonder, out there? Glockenspiel. What about? Downbeat, quarter rest, Quarter rest, and: I mean about the Dismemberment of their kith and kin, Do they ponder the sucking dread Of a sibling’s early end? Did space in its Unflappable maw, the totality, having, once there, No recourse but consciousnessless, make them…
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Corner Suite, Pacific Coast Highway, May ’20
The only thing next to you there then is The diving bell, a wigwam of passions, Inscrutable to even our doggedest detectives And theologians, those sobbing – I meant Slobbering packed minds. Finely – Finally – fine, a lee – pick your way Over to the garden. It was made just for you. If it…
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After Jabberwocky, The Desert, May ’20
Were an errant wind to blow Down a scaping rag and bluffer Your twin ‘ttached poles up kingdom come Thereby to escarp your virgin (undeflowered) Holdfast and profit, – If such a gust should contravene, ‘Gainst all contrariwise indications and plans, Laid best as they may be, And, knowing you, I know how bestly they…
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Popping Goldenrods, On the Road, May ’20
Try it for yourself, Now. I’d tell you to do it “at home,” but You can’t, so go get in a car, get it up to speed. 60 will do. Ready? Then let fall your brimming skull, loose From their fasts those stalwart neck muscles of yours. Hmm. Maybe in your case, a heavy-browed Praxiteles…
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Math man, Home, Apr ’20
‘From Conjecture to Confirmation,’ he titled his section, Proudly, swimmingly, in a state of flow. Out there the grass grew unchallenged, out there he could not Use his familiar scalpels to dissect sociality. When inequalities fail, cast the problem into topology, he was taught, Taught taught taught. And now he squats low Over a desk…
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