....From The Tree Of..................Pain Around Us
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_______________________________________________________ To Jim Seems to me the heads are crowding out the words, and so it was before, but of course, you don't remember that now- how at the end you churned out shockers, or anecdotal shorts about the BK and its misfits- and now it seems it's time again for tete-a-tete, or besting the wet-behind-the-ears, young whippersnappers who try to get the better of you, to say nothing of the ladies, lord, the ladies always loved the way you turned on southern 'shucks-ness'. Spun on dimes to produce the crispest lines of flattery you could muster in answer to a lady's tentative gushing. It is an art, that thing you do, and do so well. But in the moonlight, only you and the moon and an itching middle and index finger and thumb to keep you company, dying to wrap around a finely sharpened No. 2., the pad stares white on white. Another night without the words, though there's plenty of warmth for words you've shared before and before and before, and be fore that too ......but not so long ago, a handful of months at most, while locked inside yourself and focused, you formed alonzo out of nothing. Then arc by halfmoon arc, a chafed, red knuckle moved to the mystery of a wrist lumped with arthritis as the wonder of eve's hands bled out of yours; you may believe in opening doors because you're lonely, yet the spirit moves when locked in the hell of yourself- when a magic rare as philosopher's stone groans out and sets to spinning gold from what is gone, and what is gone now are the words and the words were you. Words are alive but you are echoes, jim, all best. Door-To-Door Sammy kept a case of better liquor for the buyers, slapped some thigh bone when he laughed, knew how to roll his eyes for effect, and never used an ellipsis in a letter: Sammy sold ...and he succeeded, on the outside of his skull; he wore the threadbare, down -and Sammy never walked where he wasn't known as "Sammy, Good Old Sammy, my oh my-", he left the tot at home, the one who always cried- -just bad for business. Two Variations On Agony She watched as he covered the monstrance, not touching it directly, linen wrapped about its base. Fingers circled round the cloth and arms raised high, his white hair perfect in a blade of blue-tinged light strained through stained glass. Wondered as she watched, if he'd opened up the last one. Turning thoughts to tortured Anthony, she summoned up the Desert Father tempted by Beelzebub with visions of lewd licentiousness, who offered up his gonads to the Lord- a look of fevered transport in the eyes shot through her- painted over and over. We are, she thought, so mesmerized by struggle; took a cigarette and burned her inner thigh, picked up an airbrush, feathered a hint of prepubescent hair. The previous one was dark, but this had mere suggestion of a thatch above and mid the coltish legs. Soft-lashed eyes looked out above a childish, open smile; pink tongue inside peeked wet with just a jot of highlight, lips a deeper berry, baring teeth too small for adult- untainted by crude appetite- like tobacco, she thought, and burned herself again. The padded, addressed, brown envelope lay on the desk awaiting playmates to be carefully placed within, and right beside it, was a needle and a razor with their edges dried a harsh maroon. The room was filled with photos of young girls she used as models for her art. She saw his white hair dampening, the beaded lip, the sweated palms, and heard his pounding heart. It pleased her to imagine these things as she daubed a month of Sundays worth of penance, bit herself until she bled, and sprayed the palest peach on two tweaked, little-girl nipples. It is finished, she thought and laughed- turned off the light, lay down in her bed. +.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+.+. And under his bed, in a locked box, sat a stack of shameful images he couldn't part with, didn't want to know who sent them- dabbed the bottom of ulcered feet with medicinal cream, then dropped another sharpened pebble in black shoes -wiped his belly, took off the sheet and placed it in the laundry bag the housekeeper would come for. Scribbled a note said simply, 'bleach', knelt down in glass, opened his breviary and reached for a state of grace that wouldn't come. There'd been mementos: cooled wax fingertips, the prints inside- a handkerchief sprayed with sweet perfume, a hair; his head spun from them, filed them under 'X' inside his mind, then prayed the Office, the longer version- while asking the Virgin to cry, give him a sign that he'd been punished enough, forgiven. The statue stood- the postman brought another package. Song For Two Voices Nearly Forty, And Holding A hundred and ten, the scale said. Now, to drop it into conversation, lightly. The woman laughed a skinny crazy woman's laugh, a little nervously- laughter like a joy buzzer, the metal kind you hide inside your palm, ending in a sound of thin, cracked glass. Yesterday at a hundred and ten and a half, she felt her heart squeeze tight then tighter still. "I will not let my body past eleven: small breasts, all legs, some subtle makeup meant to kewpie pie the rest, so men who lust for me can feel they'll get arrested---'nearly forty'-- not if I can drop a giggle or a dare into the conversation; I'll keep my hand right down their pants or I may pose on a rug, expose some parts, just watch me fascinating, bright as a Vassar bitch- it's all about itch, and how successfully you 'imply'. Long Past Forty, Fallen: Voice II Heyday's over. Flesh fills every inch of clothes. Buttocks roll in rhythms of their own. A sudden cleavage- that at least, is something; hair is thick, though graying, full in fingers. She doesn't linger now the mirror has nothing new to tell her, but her heart has its own cardiagram: I love stop love stop love stop -comes out burgundy, richer in degree than at twenty. Sings her songs in coloratura for the men who're tired of itchy bright hysteria. She's fleshy- peaceful, finally home; there's a decade yet for feasting fore the dark falls- much to her surprise, she's wise. "It's been a long time coming." Aubade I took you out of tissue, carefully unwrapped, being mindful of the gaps where tear and fray appeared. Carried you like chrism in a prison once. Didn't realize that what I thought of as a 'sanctuary' was airless prison to you- and now you're everywhere, like fliers tossed from a politician's towncar. Can't get my arms around a thing that's spread so thin- that which thundered once is common place; face, a dimmer dim, and voice, a barker's barking vintage rigoletto- but there's always the gypsy trick ..................................................of folding and moving on and I'm the only one who's sad to see what's happening, the only one whose hands do not form palm to palm, rubbed one against the other- I saw what's possible: a wizard rising in the hush eye of the storm, a voice like Moses - and although I promised myself I'd never write a poem with 'aubade' as title, there: I've done it- 'Goodbye', especially at morning ..........should be bigger. Down Long Lane In Gettysburg National Cemetery hushed with semi-circled heroes flanked by poetry, there's dignity- solemnity and reverence; nary a weed pokes through -look closer. What you will not see is one black soldier's name- while down Long Lane, the buried bones of brave black Union soldiers lay interred in plots reserved for only 'Colored' turn to dust, anonymously abide behind an invisible curtain their dying meant to rend. But boxed apart from bones of men they fought beside, who thought they'd freed the slaves did naught but open irons: minds and hearts stayed closed. No children come in Decoration Day parades and strew these graves with flowers. Some chains we see, some chains are partly pigment, partly fear of the unknown, tongueless; seen in their omissions. Only the final earth receives their worth as equal, brought together in worms by a sacred fist that smashes us all above and below the sod, the same persistent grip of God, the same ironic, laughing bosom booming love, no markers needed. Known we are, each hair and where it lay a while, which hair was straight and which was curled, why we fought, and why He's never stopped loving the world and all the absurd and feckless, foolish, sheepish creatures in it. Down Long Lane you'll find a place He sits and strokes the air, as mothers gentle their babes for sleep: a quiet place, respectful, flanked by poetry that hasn't any words. Strangers I see you thinning down, as though to turn to bone, while I spread fat, upholstered- protected from the world; I watch you strive to be Essene, divorced from fleshiness and longing, but cannot- even as I drop my own desires, Love Me Not Daisy Petals- straying more and more into the realm of thought, cloven from forceful passions felt once. It saddens me to watch you walk ahead, and picture the girl I was- vibrant, laughing, offering up her every vein and secret, locked in step beside you, knowing it's a ghost I see- and that a heavy, plodding, older bulk is following like a loved one at a funeral walks behind the coffin; your heart is younger. You should leave me to the goshawks and their 'Klee! Klee! Klee!' of delight at carrion find in a world of quick. After The Eleventh Here's how you know it's happening: first, the skin burns not so much it hurts, more like a glow after a day on the dunes; sand-blasted, whipped with sea grass, holy feel through all of it. A flagellant's thrum becomes an ah-bent-knee sunk low, in love with strum of nerves, the way the gull dips taking scoops of sky will pull you to him. No walls, no waves to fight, you tuck your knees to chest, spread out the arms flap streams of propellant air beneath and rise above it. Far below a ghost will raise its face still glued in heavy shoes, it's sensible, leaden feet are shod in pennyloafer weights, jammed into accusing vamps,the newly minted quarters with New York and Lady Lamp- and though they aren't there, two towers seen in strobe forevermore: Here/Gone. Here/Gone. That's when you will feel the awful touch of God's Before & After: city below Gehenna now, smoking in the harbor slowly burning. Silhouette At The Edge Of The World Atop Cemetery Hill, contrasting with the red-orange sky -a charger, one hoof in air, a man on horseback. Jaunty hat; confident, with reins in hand, it's Hancock, lording over the highest ground there was. He sits astride his horse in every season; I've seen pictures in the snow, the glow of whitest white 'gainst black, and always, fine as razor cuts, the outline: man and horse. A sprawling, giant oak down hill, caught as though by scissors- leaves made lace- and lower, lunettes ring hills where cannon stood once, booming. Laser cut, this tableau of remarkable slaughter heroes, timelessness, but camera lens caught something else: the Gettysburg crazy man, the wanderer of streets, always the same outfit- almost a uniform: beige, long sleeved shirt, green work pants, eyes of palest blue, in need of a shave and often, smelling ripe. He sat back pressed against the granite, head hung toward his chest, his knees up, hands were resting on them- fingers open, draping down and everything about him spoke of loneliness futility and endings. Hancock couldn't raise him to heroic, though the man pressed close as though to drain a little courage for himself, but Hancock's just a statue; he sat on only a hill, cartloads of tourists honking, passing by, inside their lives and he, without- alone and addled- saddled with life I can't imagine- gets up morning after morning, feeling smaller than a man would walking ordinary streets --let alone in shadow of time and place that raised so many up while cutting them down. I have a picture- I have the silhouette of two men at the edge of the world and one man's lips are moving, much too far away to read- I wonder who he talks to: God or Hancock? Whose forgiveness- whose vast arms to raise him up, to kiss a battered cheek, long past embarrassment, who does he hunger for the more. On To Page 15 .............. Return To Contents This site sponsered by 
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