THE WEATHER
 (For Jean Arp))

The sky was bird.      Blue skies in tree, flower.      Clouds bristle, brilliant,      Sun is wet with clouds.

INVENTORY
 (After Jacques Prevert)

To begin with they had:      Three jack-out-of-the-boxes      Seven nights with an old cow      One sow      Three sewers, six pipe stems, seven miracle workers      One friend      Two peddles, eight zodiacs      Two years, one pitch, three crying men      Sixteen muscles      Eight clouds      Five rainbows, one thread      Six cacophonous oysters      Nine piles of rugs, three wars      Nine porcupines      Two three’s      Three cufflinks      Six penelopes      One envelope      Five nuptials, three sunrises      One born-on-the-moon      Three old rains      One horsefly      Four record machines      Five polyhydrons      One Pollyanna      Three polydor corridors      One mother-of-pearl      Seven ears of corn      One ether container      Three spoons      Six volcanoes      Eight flies      Three hundred pillagers      Five pillars      Four wedding nights      Six naughty knots      Eight village idiots      One more cloud      Nine pyramids      And seven of everything else including:      Six insane buttercups      One tire      Three beds of clover      And eight gloves.

AGENDA

First, ride off into the sky.      Take out the garbage,      Take in the garbage.      Collect future raptures,      Then design an empire of light.      Polish door handles,      Next, ascertain the weight of approximately everything.      Contain passions until night,      Fire up the elastic rain.      Come      Go      Eat      Build up your stores,      Thrash the sun,      Pile up unused tendrils      Throw turnips at a priest,      Blow your nose      Blow someone else’s nose.      Wash Spain      Prick a balloon and catch the air,      Rest.      Do an impossible task      Like wrangling from Jehovah a family of ostriches.      Have a footrace with your fireplace      Clothes can be implemented to wit:      Polyhedrons      Cactus nails      And lounging by the sea.      Scour the even days,      Place a hermit on a fuming smokestack      Chase nocturnal chambermaids.      Grease a lollypop,      Complete the assignment by undressing the Mona Lisa.

WAITING

The winds sigh of old bishops      Whom sheepishly we eye.      The purple flax of dawn’s nose,      Dripping white cells to the east.      Outside a blizzard,      Inside a tempest,      Sharpen the tapered end      Of the whole matter.      Time is fine sand,      Molten in the cabbage sunshine.      Rise to greet me;      The pillow is still soft      From where your grey old goats      Ran bespeckled in the glow,      Carrying cameras no doubt,      As the weather was only      A sad old magician      Forever pulling skinned rabbits      From a non-existent hat.      The trolley wheezes its dust      Over the limp figure      Of a sailor      About to expire      On the edge of the Sun.      Black smoke rises from his belly,      No sound is heard.      No shadows are cast      In front of the waiting inspectors who      Curiously and with obvious distaste      Remove and catalogue all forms      Of human dignity or vanity      From the compost of reality.      Their caps are not sweet,      Their old fuzz reeks of gin,      Mark them:      They have the power to set afire stone,      Or murder handmaidens who      Pry off their own dishes      From the world’s table.      The story doesn’t end here either,      Floods, tides, stones,      Clous, mandarins, stars,      Rams, tics and angels follow      In quick procession      Like so many squealing, open-mouthed sanguines,      In endless lines, all screaming:      Feed me… Feed me… Feed me.

WHISKY IN THE KETTLE

Snow-flake-fall              on      The head is indelicate,      Wheels turn,      Rats burn,      O, shell me;      I am a turnip.      Silly isn’t it?      Come here and put down the various loads you bear.      Begin to tear off your flesh,      It may be hung on the pillow.      (Correction: The north of Venice is particularly nice      when you’re in the south)      If you’re there, spank it and      Send it to bed without its rooster.      Now, if I could see      I’d have you over for dinner next week.      We’d eat my glasses and follow that up      With a tearjerker and      Some old brassiers behind the barn.      I was born on a wheelbarrow,      As a result      I am not fully recognizable.      It can be a matter of spice,      A matter of corn or dice,      But, baby, EAT IT!      You’ll die laughing and you      Never had it so good.

LAMENT

O the moon at noon      And time for silver      Is weighing heavily on all things.      Highest of the low      Seek pleasure in small diversions      Like catapulting and      Sewing together salted crackers.      Weep ‘til the Earth is born anew,      Scream, tear out your buttons,      Relax, it’s allover.      Pop in a fresh one.      There is never enough fuel for that fire.      Trust God, he never lets you down.      All the choir waits, impatiently chatting      About solar eclipses and the ring in the tub.

FREE TEA

Inside and beside      The little nook      We see an emerald toy;      The rain is here and      It washes the dew      From my binocular’s whisker.      Inside at the bedside      Ride several tiny toys;      The process involved in writing a poem      Is the same as whipping an ostrich:      It’s faster where it is blue,      And nowhere nearer the Earth

CHARGE

Now, exit my comrades      To meet yet another day,      At noon I trust.      The waves have been broken      On the shore      Here I am again,      Stringing pearls on a grasshopper.

HERE'S CORNELIUS
(For Cornelius Agrippa)

Twice a tincture of glutinous Fabula     Crystal sing – bell ring     All the angels will sing      Of the end of the red dragon.      He dies as molten or merely liquid Mercury      Is born anew and sing,      Sing forever.

POEM

“Why isn’t it that rusty brains don’t squeak?”      Asked Capatain Jodpurs, as ever      Alert to a ruse or a rose;      “A rose is a ruse is a rose” says I      With one hand under the skirt      Of my feline temple dancer.      O, ‘tis a fine sight more bright than tit.      Bellowed below.      I cackled,      The cow jumped under the moon,      The little dog laughed and then      Shit on the spoon,      The table collapsed,      A volcano muttered,      A pinch of garlic, stir well,      And….

POETRY

The celestial crank case careens      With a golden Equinox      Silent      As barnacles attack aged typewriters,      Old suns expire with a sound      Like polished peppermint.      A canopy over the sky is fixed      For eating oysters      How are the oysters?      Those little sidewinders,      You feed them coins      And they give you back tambourines.      Polite nutmeg in the windmill,     The seeds of experience pass by,     The doom of excelsior.            Can this be the end?     Can this be Heaven?     Can these be oysters?     Is there a moon out tonight?

Chapter Three