Free Verse

One and one make two,
the literalist said.
So far they've made five billion,
said the lateralist, or ten
times that, if you count the dead.

The dog came back,
grinning and smelling of carrion,
and her husband behind it, stride and gestures
too large for the house. His field voice, cracking,
declared a wider kingdom,
and the name of a fallen city,
not theirs this time.
From outside the roar and shrill
of celebration poured in.
He drew near in a rank cloud, breathing hard,
to show her the gash in his thumb.
So she washed in five waters and went to their bed,
but he slept without moving,
still in his cloak and dust.

I need everything else
Anything else
Desperately
But I have nothing
Shall have nothing
but this
Immediate, inescapable
and invaluable
No one can afford
THIS
Being made here and now

(Seattle, Washington
17 May, 1955)

MARIGOLDS

Having returned at last and being carefully seated
On the floor — somebody else's floor, as usual —
Far away across that ocean which looked
Through Newport windows years ago — somebody else's livingroom —
Another messed-up weedy garden
Tall floppy improbably red flowers
All the leaves turned over in the rain
Ridged furry scrotum veins

does

1. Cairo 1326

Koran

2. Syria

3. The Nusayris

4. Mecca

5. Isfahan

6. Delhi

Júgí

7. Calicut

The stairs lead to the room as bleak as glass
Where fancy turns the statues.
The empty chairs are dreaming of a protocol,
The tables, of a treaty;
And the world has become a museum.

(The girl is gone,
Fled from the broken altar by the beach,
From the unholy sacrifice when calms became a trade-wind.)

1

A Personage is seen
Leaning upon a cushion
Printed with cornflowers.

A Child appears
Holding up a pencil.

“This is a picture
(Says the Child to the Personage)
Of the vortex.”

“Draw it your own way,”
Says the Personage.

(Music is heard
Pure in the island windows,
Sea-music on the Child’ s
Interminable shore, his coral home.)

How light the heavy world becomes, when with transparent waters
All the shy elms and wakeful appletrees are dressed!
How the sun shouts, and spins his wheel of flame
And shoots the whole land full of diamonds
Enriching every flower’ s watery vesture with his praise,
O green spring mornings when we hear creation singing!

The non-action of the wise man is not inaction.
It is not studied. It is not shaken by anything.
The sage is quiet because he is not moved,
Not because he wills to be quiet.
Still water is like glass.
You can look in it and see the bristles on your chin.
It is a perfect level;
A carpenter could use it.
If water is so clear, so level,
How much more the spirit of man?
The heart of the wise man is tranquil.