Sometimes when my eyes are red
I go up on top of the RCA Building
and gaze at my world, Manhattan —
my buildings, streets I’ ve done feats in,
lofts, beds, coldwater flats
— on Fifth Ave below which I also bear in mind,
its ant cars, little yellow taxis, men
walking the size of specks of wool —
1 Reverse the book in duration. What does that mean? I am writing to you. These notes now when it’ s too late.
2 If the cyborg you read about in bookstores is an immigrant from Mexico crossing into the U. S. beneath a floodlit court, then mine is a Punjabi-British hitchhiker on a JI visa. This is tunneling as seen from a satellite — sort of concave warp in the dirt of the line.
Sex is always monstrous. Blood appears in the air next to the body but nobody asks a question about the body. “Please touch me there. More. Oh god.” For a hitchhiker, the problem of the boudoir is transferred to a makeshift, itchy, unsafe space on the verge of a New Mexico highway. It is often the sex of another era, in which the socks and dress shirt/blouse are not necessarily removed.
I
That case-hardened cop.
A bull moose in a boghole
brought him to a stop.
II
From his grassy knoll
he has you in his crosshairs,
the accomplice mole.
III
The sword once a share.
This forest a fresh-faced farm.
This stone once a stair.
IV
The birch crooks her arm,
as if somewhat more inclined
to welcome the swarm.
V
He has, you will find,
two modes only, the chipmunk:
fast-forward; rewind.
VI
She. My people came from Korelitz
where they grew yellow cucumbers
and studied the Talmud.
He. Mine pored over the mud
of mangold- and potato-pits
or flicked through kale plants from Comber
as bibliomancers of old
went a-flicking through deckle-mold.
She. Mine would lie low in the shtetl
when they heard the distant thunder
stolen by the Cossacks.
He. It was potato sacks
lumped together on a settle
mine found themselves lying under,
the Peep O'Day Boys from Loughgall
making Defenders of us all.
MILDRED COLLYMORE told the No. 3 Supreme Court yesterday that when she recovered from an attack with a stone she found herself "washed-way" in blood.
Collymore said also that accused Philamena Hinds came back to move the rock but she would not let her.
The complainant said that on the day of the incident she left her home and went over to her daughter's on the other side of the road to cut the grass from around the place. When she got to the spot she said dirt was on the grass and she took the hoe and raked it away.
for DreamChad on the death of her sun Mark - mark this word mark this place + tyme - at Papine Kingston Jamaica - age 29
midnight 28/29 April 2001-1002-0210-0120-0020-0000
rev 29 feb 04
WHAT CAN I SAY BUT THIS MY DARLING
WHAT CAN I DO BUT TRY TO SPEECH MY HEART YR HEART FROM BREAKING
.
Shut, shut the door, good John! fatigu'd, I said,
Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick, I'm dead.
The dog-star rages! nay 'tis past a doubt,
All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out:
Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand,
They rave, recite, and madden round the land.
I
My black face fades,
hiding inside the black granite.
I said I wouldn't
dammit: No tears.
I'm stone. I'm flesh.
My clouded reflection eyes me
like a bird of prey, the profile of night
slanted against morning. I turn
this way — the stone lets me go.
