Lent, Gas Line

 

from this week in February, 1974  (I was 29)

 

  During Lent, Gas Line

 

I’ve exhausted my supply

my energy’s been drained

my engine stands cold

there’s no gas in the tank

a procession of autos

kneels at each station

Supplication

 

The Smoking of the Universal Joint

 

from this week in January, 1974  (I was 29)

 

The Smoking of the Universal Joint

 

The dip stick was dry

and there was oil all over hell

I was a defeated man

so I left it there down at the garage

I went to Ben’s for a beer and a pepperoni

sat on the bench in front of the store

Windy as hell too blowing dust

The damn thing smoked like hell

The mechanic was the garage owner’s son

overworked and pissed off

He could bury it for all I cared

Damn rolling jail

Swirls of snow

 

December 27, 1974  (I was 30)

 

Swirls of snow

powder the air of Cold Mountain

From my breath crystal mist

obscures and reveals                

 

Blurred vision clears the mind                

thought vapors enhance the image                

the moon illuminates the wind

scatters light over the crags

 

That time

 

April 29, 1974  (I was 29)

 

That time

the train stopped at this unfamiliar station

(whose name we have already forgotten)

we stepped onto the platform

Through the transitory depot

we entered the stationary world again

But by this time we understood the subtleties of travel

We knew the lies of relativity

so we laughed at vehicle trees

In fact that thought remains most vividly

connected to our arrival-

vehicle trees

 

We are settled now into summer

What was apprehension is confidence

We are secure and we cannot be intimidated

There are no nightmares there is no darkness

The neighbors are polite they admire our garden

We’re giving all our money to the poor

The weather is amorous and the beach is secluded

We wonder now why it took us this long

Though the oaks have slowed

they remain reminders of our

recent travels

Spring Training in the Bush

 

March 12, 1974  (I was 29)

 

   Spring Training in the Bush

That man in Canada did not die

With the bayonet at his throat

He turned and ran weaponless

Sliding across the border like stealing second

We’ve been hitless ever since

Still we blame the stranded runner

Most of our hitters got drafted

Some signed heavy contracts

How many outs we got?

Still no score

Maybe we could’ve won with more like him

Bunt and run men

Give him the sign

In the end it don’t matter whether you struck out

Or whether you were thrown out at home

1 Finger Exorcise

 

February 21,1974  (I was 29)

 

         1 Finger Exorcise

I am so comically alive

I wonder seriously how

I survive  I’m possessed

I’m teeming with inept imps

I swear everyone limps

I can’t be blamed

I haven’t been the same

It’s those imps

those maniac monkeys

who take over and there’s nothing to do

They’ve got you

Living possessed

like you’ve never been blessed

those screamers make a laugh out of you

Those devils whose revels bevel the spirit

Boredom or passion

whatever the fashion

they howl you ashen

What the hell

can’t you tell

It’s the imps

It’s gotta be the imps

you know it’s the imps

What else could it be

but the imps

Driving spikes

 

February 14, 1974  (I was 29)

 

Driving spikes

with strong strokes

sinking steel into good wood

 

Driving spikes

arm hand hammer

current flowing through the muscle

 

Driving spikes

each reverberation

sets the next stroke

 

Setting spikes

speed the likes

of which you’ve never seen

 

Hitting nails

into rails

striking mechanical chants

 

Vision focused

arcs defined

strong stood stance

straw

 

February 10,1974  (I was 29)

 

         straw

The grass on the hillside is tender

the small flowers make their annual proclamation

insects are flying in tandem

The sun opens every pore

releases every fertile fragrance

birdsong fills the canyon

Ignorant man is ignored by nature

the significant ladybug walks along the blade

The bird chorus (so beautiful various and new)

will not be interrupted by a distant car starter

that will not will not start the car

or by the small piston plane sucking air in

to snuff it out again

Both are soon lost in the unconscious melody

and the silent motions of flight

So why have I not renounced my own noise

I take no lasting joy from the mountain

I have mechanical commitments to my own devices

and I am not a bird

Soft fallen weather

 

January 4, 1974  (I was 29) 

 

Soft fallen weather

we stroll now upon the air

feet lost in feathers

Upon the teachings of Pulin Garg

 

December 6, 1974  (I was 30) 

        

     Upon the teachings of Pulin Garg

Accept other perceptions of the self

I am this and more

I am the asshole you perceive

and the saint my mother knew

I accept the personage of honest perception

without reservation or obligation

The free ego continues to select its roles

                  *

Walking through Sather Gate

I saw a beautiful young woman

approaching me directly

I stepped up to her

put my arms about her

and kissed her on the lips

suddenly she said

oh you have ruined my experiment

What experiment?

I was advancing straight toward men

counting how many would pass on the right

and how many on the left

but you came straight ahead and kissed me

Chè Discharges the Minister of Literature

 

December 1, 1974  (I was 30)

 

   Chè Discharges the Minister of Literature

Revolutionaries have always needed poets

someone to leave the honest hills

a missionary of hope, a distant victory

lungs filled with oxygen beyond this quick breath.

 

An assignment of rediscovery -consider it-

somewhere beyond dysentery and that distant hill

to know again how it is we are here

among so many strangers so close to home.

Before this

 

November 21, 1974  (I was 30)

 

Before this

the wind blew straight down.

Hairstyles changed.

Some wondered when it would blow up.

The sheep didn’t care

the wool was over their eyes.

Skyscrapers?   Banal.

Who could look up?

The wind blew straight down;

we couldn’t lift the manhole covers.

Airlines were suddenly grounded;

stocks fell.

The waters were calm.

Sir Edmund Hillary was called a cheat.

Some old folks were caught prone.

How long can this keep up? became the joke.

The wind blew straight down.

It seemed like it would happen forever,

yet here we still are.

I never ate so many potatoes.

I never realized Newtonian physics

could be so ethereal,

and I hadn’t believed

chaos could be so quickly accommodated.

You and me we

 

November 12, 1974  (I was 29)   

 

You and me we

aint the kind

called a credit to the race

are we

Most don’t look

and none of ‘em hear

They don’t know and

we could care

could we

It’s not the same

the world’s changed

We stepped out and they

say we fell behind

but we didn’t did we

We been there

and we oughta know

if anyone does

We seen it heard it touched it

Hell I even tasted it

but they never been anywhere else

have they

We’ve thrown out

more’n they ever brought in

You know this better’n me

I don’t need to tell you

I’ve seen it in your eyes

the way you walk

I can hear it in your voice

A lot of them had it easy not us

We paid our dues together

and people like us

we’ll be together to the end

won’t we

Magicians

 

November 7, 1974 (I was 29)  

 

         Magicians

                  1

Formulae are not magic;

precise measurements are made in the corroded kitchen

(the technicians are clean but their chemicals corrode).

Precise measurements produce the desired compounds.

The automated scientist makes the right moves

and molecular orbits are reordered,

routine practiced and polished.

                 2

The truth of routine is extended lie;

it does not have a day one.

Its deadly infinity is both linear and circular;

repetition becomes a subtle puzzle,

a rubber stamp applied with random force,

the jigsaw continuity of separate reality,

ink arranged in capillaries.

                 3

Magic is the end not the means.

The result of the experiment is predetermined,

the eye becomes a caliper, the hand a scale pan

the ear a syncopated metronome.

The tuned performer is in harmony with the performance;

the volunteer is levitated

but it’s the magician who feels like he’s floating.

                 4

After awhile there are no tricks.

The wand disappears, the arc is still there,

a comet as quick as we imagine comets to be.

Sneer of cold command weathers to benign smile,

incantation gives way to chanting.

The audience is made of stone

and water and tree and cloud and stars.

 

Long Tom

 

October 15, 1974  (I was 29)

 

Long Tom,

What ever became of intellectual clarity?

 

It was not so long ago

that we survived all the shit going down

by understanding our ultimate righteousness.

 

We knew it was advantageous to be firm and correct.

Our lives were all sixes and nines.

We mused on autumn afternoons;

 

you knew about Sufism and dervishes and Essenes,

and I knew about Emerson, Thoreau and Ahab.

We were focused on the whirl of transcendental possibility.

 

Now you have died privately

and I have stepped through to uncertain ground.

New ignorance is the product of old truth.

Passing Time

 

September 24, 1974  (I was 29)

 

Passing Time

My wife’s old aunts live

across the street from their cemetery plots

Quite a view

from the window above the kitchen sink

They already live in trailer homes

Actually quite spacious they say

as one washes and the other one dries

They walk over there everyday

It’s good exercise they say

and they are nothing if not ordered and regular

It’s not sad at all barely poignant 

Rather efficient emotionally speaking

I can admire that

I’d like to be buried in a hole

convenient to the digger

I don’t like fire or cold water

but I wouldn’t complain

if they took my ashes to the ocean

and threw them in there

Thinking About Snow

 

September 19, 1974  (I was 29)

 

Thinking About Snow After Listening to

John Chancellor Talk About Drug Research

 

little flakes

damn dissolving crystals

millions becoming liquid

brain fuses melting with every breath

Blizzard Blizzard lost in the z’s

ozone snow twenty below

channel thirteen all day long

cloud breath

Jack London on snowshoes

Conrad Aiken blowing about the corners

frozen lungs

son of snow

patron saint of slippery streets

sleet’s elite one

profound drifts

alive in an igloo

Social Science and General Business

 

August 22, 1974  (I was 29)

 

Social Science and General Business

When I was in 9^th grade Mr. Drobnik wanted to know

what a city manager was or

if you didn’t know that he wanted to know

the price of eggs in China

If you didn’t know he wanted to know

what did you know in no uncertain terms

You knew this was high school

He wanted to know specifically

how to balance a checkbook

and how much you paid for eggs in China

if you paid by check

We studied occupations then did oral reports

I learned some people laugh when you say

you are thinking of becoming a barber

so I added meteorologist to my list

Eventually I never cut any hair

and I only tell the weather if somebody asks

Tenses sense nets

 

July 2, 1974  (I was 29)

 

Tenses      sense nets

                                   

   Tense sense      send tense

 

       Ten cents      sen tence

 

    Tense sents      cnet nes

 

   Tense scents      cnet nesses

                   

    Tense cents      tence nesses

 

     Tense says      ten sentences

 

     Tense nets      ten setive

 

      Ten sense      tense set

 

       Net sense      tenes set                                  

 

         First published in West Coast Poetry Review

 

 

QUESTIONS for an eighth- grade discussion:

What do you sense about this poem?

How much is the poem worth?

What sport is the poem about?

Why is the poem arranged as it is?

If it’s a sports poem, what’s missing?

What did Robert Frost say about poetry and tennis?

Is the poet playing with Robert Frost?

What pair of lines is the only complete thought?

What words are neologisms, words made up for the poem?

Does the poem have a main idea?

What does this poem do?

 

DIRECTIONS for an eighth- grade writing assignment:

1.  Examine the example of “concrete poetry” above. 

2.  List ten sentences explaining ideas you found in the poem.

3.  Write a paragraph explaining your idea of what “concrete poetry” must be

     if this is an example of it.