Strings
Strange fits of passion! The author’s hyperventilating
defense of geraniums in First World Flowers,
his overmodulation over “the dark period”
of tea rose breeding: what works on others
sometimes leaves me numb.
The blush and bliss of sappy violins,
sap existing not only in thistle
but lubricated music, pre-fab Manilow.
The intensity of string coloration
on the stereo this morning in concert
with the sun’s expansions –
If there were none attached, how unencumbered.
How trance in progress, everlastingness.
Since no one instant is
inherently different from another,
time has invariance. No strings.
Just the fluid ongoing, l’eau to l’eau,
no stain = = tape = = restraints
equal to the moment bleeding through.
Hi Ma. I’m working on my book.
Well, when this one’s finished,
don’t do it again.
My air conditioner quit, she says.Surfaces in contact
do not touch everywhere.
Just so = = Just there.
When I survey the brightest reaches
in whatever direction I look it looks
the same. Only the silo distinguishes
our local sample from the remote.
Wrens live in the bullet holes.
How can I leave this to the unlove
of someone else? Unless I become
the opposite of connoisseur,
an immersant, reveler, welcomer
of everything that is = = that is
whale fossils with feet, the benefits of
making robots look less like people,
math abuse and innumeracy, worm’s brains,
many body problems, vinyl, chitin, nonelite greens,
unless I understand the secondary spongiosa
as a vaulted structure.
Books have been written!
Most people want blurbish blobs of praise.
Can I see each as a good thing of its kind
and love not only the stand-up sister,
but the Group for the Suppression of Fuschia?
Tell them to go fry ice, my mother says.
At K-Mart, a strange woman about 65
asked her for a ride. I said yes,
my mother says. Don’t do it again! I interject.
I took her to the door and she tried to
give me a dollar as she got out.
Don’t do it. Of course, I wouldn’t
take it. Don’t. I thought
you’d say gee, Ma, you’re a good soul, she says.
She greets those who are cast down and beclouded,
those troubled and filled with lament,
those who joy and those who make
the mild electronic hum
of this century’s ambient sound.
May some find herein physically relevant
charms against extinction: don’t
give rides to strangers,
sit down in your good white linen suit,
use so many dictionary words,
shovel your own path or go on vacation
with you know who, drink
only grapefruit juice, let anybody check in
without baggage demanding
a high floor with nothing
between them and the ground,
get to Mass to late to get a vigil
light or become a flash
in the pan –
Like you I long for proto-fairness, some justice
that would let us live
in affirmation of eternity.
But what mind, what treetop research,
can rise high enough
for canopy studies of
the complete?
Recently I noticed the tiny small black blossoms
in the middle of the queen anne’s lace.
All those years of seeing without seeing
the weed’s most exquisite feature.
I knew the red speck in the center,
but I didn’t know of its unfolding.
It must be a bud that gives way to such
eldritch petals, really tiny violets.
Examine them today, not tomorrow.
Notice too the understory of rungs, the way
the flower hinges on green stays
as the century closes
and language strings consciousness to difference:
a stain = = tape = = restraint = =
equal to the moment bleeding through
the unknown on both sides of the non-
linear equation. Strings squash abundance
which, face it, there’s too much of.
They crunch invariance to flair
and highlight: the bundle, what was it,
my aunt brought each Monday,
white paper, bound with twine = =
Hi Ma. I’m working on my book.
Do you have to do that?
Let this be the last. My fan
is on the blink, she adds.Surfaces in contact do not touch everywhere.
When every moment’s full of severance
what’s left but to revel
in the delible
unlingering, precisely this
goldening = = dawn = = silo = = bird
singing contrapuntal above
the edgeless mono calm
of appliances, this century’s timpani.
The intensity of string coloration
on the stereo in concert
with the sun’s expansions!
It isn’t simplicity that epiphanizes me, it’s
saturation, the maximal, interwoven
thrombosis and richness of
contributors to each morsel of
what-is: this density
in which all entities
exist. It works. It wilds = =
The unknown on both sides of the don’t:
forget to use your noodle, write any more
essay-reviews, get knocked for a loop,
miss that show about the guy who gets
the paper the day before
and prevents a lot of accidents,
buy a lamp without a shade,
encourage intercourse with spirits,
go ashcan over tomato can,
have bouts, or fail
to give everyone my best red garters, she says.
I give my best regards to those
who are cast down and beclouded,
those who pursue the miraculous
as a gesture of defiance,
heretics who worship the chapel perilous,
those who live in the proactive is
to whom each moment is spacious
and those who gnash and weep alone.
May they find herein some charms
against excruciation and speak them
gently, disencumbered.
When I survey the lightest reach of thee –
the intensity of string coloration in concert
with the sun’s expansiveness on the silo’s curve,
the unknown on both sides of the non-
linear brightness, the reciprocity swerving
everywhere exceeds my radiance threshold and life
forgive me! I have to close my eyes.
Hi Ma. I finished my book.
It cooled off nice.
Thanks. I’m glad you like it.
Page(s) 88-93
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