FOR LOVE

Poems 1950-1960

FOR LOVE
Poems 1950-1960

ROBERT CREELEY

Charles Scribncrs Sons

Hew

York

1962 Robert Creeley Copyright This book published simultaneously in the United States of America and in Canada -Copyright under
the Berne Convention
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without the permission of Charles Scribner's Sons.
13 15 17 19 21 23 25 27 29

C/P

30 28 26 24 22 20 18 16 14 12

Poems

in Parts
i,

and 2 were

Erst collected as follows:

All in Part

except "Naughty Boy," in

in Part 2 in

THE WHIP by Robert Creeley

(Migrant Books, 1957)

"Naughty Boy" and

all

A FORM OF

WOMEN

by Robert

Creeley (Jargon Books in association with Corinth Books, copyright 1959 Robert Creeley)

appeared in the United States in the Mountain Review, Poetry (Chicago), following periodicals: Evergreen Review, Measure, The Naked Ear, Texas Quarterly, Neon (Supplement to Now), Hearse, Yugen, Ark 11 Moby 1, Inland.
of the poems in Part 2
first

Some

Black

poems in Part 3 Erst appeared in the United States in the following periodicals: Between Worlds, Big Table, Chelsea, Elizabeth,
of the
Folio, Inscape,

Some

New

Directions Annual,

The

Nation, National Review,

Poetry (Chicago), Quagga, Trobar,

White Dove Review, Yugen.

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress Catalog Card

Number 62-8903

ISBN 684-71738-7

for

Bobbie

who makes

all

things possible

PREFACE

Wherever it is one stumbles (to get to wherever) at least some way will exist, so to speak, as and when a man takes
this or that step

for which,

god

bless him. Insofar as

poems are such places, always they were ones stumbled into: warmth for a night perhaps, the misdirected intention come right; and too, a sudden instance
these
of love,
trives a

and the being loved, wherewith a world (of his own mind).
to

man

also con-

It

seems

me, now, that

I
is

know

less of these

poems
if

than will a reader, at least the reader for

write for anyone
like to please! It

whom
I

have written.

How much

should

a constant concern.

That

however, hopeful and pompous, and not altogether true. I write poems because it pleases me, very much I think that is true. In any case, we live as we
is,

can, each day another

there

is

more, say, to live than what there is, to poem as close to this fact as I can bring

no use in counting. Nor live. I want the

it;

or

it,

me.

R. C.

CONTENTS
Preface

1950-1955
.
.

Hart Crane

15

Chanson

Le Fou

Song

17 18
.
.

35 Don't Sign Anything The Conspiracy 37

. .

The

Crisis 19 For Rainer Gerhardt

.

I
. .

Know

Man
.
.

38
.

20

The Riddle 21 The Rites 22 The Rhyme 23 The Innocence 24 The Ball Game 25 The Carnival 26
.
. .

The End The Death The Lover

39

of
. .

Venus
41
.
.

40

Counterpoint
for

42

Wait

Me

43
.

27 The Kind of Act of

.
.

After Lorca

The Business 44 The Disappointment The Warning 46

. . .
.

45

28
. .

A
29

Form
. .

of Adaptation

47

The Dishonest Mailmen The Crow 30 The Immoral Proposition

. .

Song

48
.

31

For

W.

C.

W.
.

32
33 34

49 Naughty Boy Like They Say 50 La Noche 50

.

Apple Uppfle

The Whip
All

51

The Operation

That Is Lovely in

Men

2
Juggler's

1956-1958

Thought
of

55

The Three

Ladies

61

Form

Women
.
.

.56

Oh No
Goodbye

..
. .

62
63
.
.

They Say

58
.

The

Friend
.

59

The

Interview

64
.
.

Please

60

Wicker Basket

65

The Bed

..

66
.
.

Saturday Afternoon

85

Just Friends

The Wind
.

..

67 68
69

The

Invoice
.

86
87 88

Somewhere

Air: "Cat Bird Singing"

New

Year's
.
.

..

The Hero 70 The Way 72 The Traveller

.
.
.

89 Song Bird Lady

.

90
.
.

73
75

For a Friend
Entre

91 91

Marriage
to

74
. .

Nous
.

She Went

Stay
. .

Sing Song

92

Folk Song

75

And

93
.

Ballad of the Despairing

Heroes

94
.
.

Husband

76
78

Damon &
.

Going

to

Bed
.
.

95

Pythias

If You 79 The Tunnel The Saints The Names

.

80
81

The Flower 96 The Letter 97 The Place 98 The Souvenir 99

.
.

82
..

For the
83

New
. .

Year
101

100

A Gift of My Love

Great Value
.

84

The Door The Hill

104

1959-1960
. .

The Awakening
Kore
. .

107

08
. .

A Token The Man

.

123
.

124
.

The Rain The Woman

Midnight
. .

109
.

no

in
112
.
.

The Memory To And 126 A Wish 127

. .

125

The Kid
Lady

..

Song
113

128
.

in Black
.
.

The
Not

Sign Board

129

The Plan The Joke The Song The Bird

Yellow
.
.

114 116
.

Now
.
.

130
.

The Time
Song
.

131

117 118

132
.

119
. .

The Cracks
Jack's Blues

120
.

The Rescue The Paradox The End of the

.
.

133
.

134

121
.

Out

of Sight

122

135 Day The Women

136

For Fear

137

The Gift .. The House

The
Air:

138
. .

139
.

Young Woman
Pool
. .

140

'The

141 Love of
.

Woman"
.
.

142 143

The Rose 148 The Eye .. 150 Love Comes Quietly After MaUarm 152 The People .. 153 The Wife 154 The Snow 155
.
. . . . .
. .

151

Mind's Heart

Fire

The Name 144 The First Time .. 146 The Figures .. 147

156 For Friendship 157 The Gesture .. 158 For Love ..159
. .
. .

1950-1955

HART CRANE
for Slater

Brown

He had been stuttering, by the edge

of the street, one foot
still

on the sidewalk, and the other

in the gutter
.
. .

like a bird, say, wired to flight, the wings, pinned to their motion, stuffed.

The words,
senses.

several,

and

for each, several

'It is

very difficult to
It

sum up

briefly

."

always was.

(Slater, let

me come

home.

The letters have proved insufficient. The mind cannot hang to them as it could
to the words.

There are ways beyond what I have here to work with, what my head cannot push to any kind
of conclusion.

But

my own ineptness

cannot bring them to hand,

the particulars of those times

we had talked.)

"Men

kill

themselves because they are

afraid of death,

he says

."

The push
beyond and
into

Respect, they said he respected the ones with the learning, lacking it

himself

(Waldo Frank
6 languages)

& his

What had seemed

important

While Crane sailed

(so that

to

Mexico

was writing

one betrayed
himself)

He slowed
(without those friends
to

keep going,

to

keep up), stopped dead and the head could not

go further
without those friends
.
. .

And so it was I entered the "broken world

Hart Crane.
Hart

16

LE FOU
for Charles

who plots,

then, the lines talking, taking, always the beat from the breath

(moving slowly
the breath

at first

which
I

is

slow

it is

mean, graces come slowly, that way.

So slowly (they are waving

we are moving
away from
which
is

(the trees the usual (go by

slower than

this, is

(we
goodbye

are moving!

A SONG
for

Ann

had wanted a quiet testament and I had wanted, among other

a song.

things,

That was

to

be

of a like monotony.

(A grace
Simply. Very very quiet.
thrush, though
I

A murmur of some lost

have never seen one.

Which was you

and

then. Sitting so, at peace, so very much

now

this

same

quiet.

A song.
And of you
perpetuity
the sign now, surely, of a gross
is

(which
it is

not reluctant, or

if it is,

no longer important.

A song.
Which one
with
care.
sings,
if

he sings

it,

18

THE

CRISIS

Let me say (in anger) that we have never had a towel

since the day

we were

married

where anyone could

the fact.

find

it,

Notwithstanding that
simple to live with, not my own judgement, but no
matter.

am not

There are other

to kiss
is

things:

you

not

to love you.

Or not so simply.
Laughter releases rancor, the quality of mercy
strained.
is

not

FOR RAINER GERHARDT

Impossible, rightly, to define these conditions of

friendship, the wandering be of use, somehow
to

& inexhaustible wish to

be helpful
wish

when it isn't simple,

otherwise, convulsed, and leading nowhere I can go.

What one knows,

simple, convulsed,

then, not

and

feeling

(this night) petulance of all conditions, not

wondered, not even

felt.

have

felt

felt that if it

being

so,

I have were simpler, and it were a matter only of

nothing,

an incredible indifference
(to us)
it all

they might say

but not friends, the acquaintances, but you,

Rainer.

And likely there is

petulance in us

kept apart.

20

THE RIDDLE
What

it is,

the literal size

incorporates.

The question
is

mute question. One

one wants

is

too lonely,

to stop there, at the

edge of

conception.

The woman
the

imperative,
lost in stern

man

thought:

give the name

it

form

certainly,
titles.

and

21

THE

RITES

(Hogpen, deciduous growth,

etc.

making neither much dent

nor any feeling: the trees completely
or incompletely attached to ground

During which time all the time sounds of an and what are they talking
about

anterior conversation

Cares mount.
certainly
as

My own
Between

much as anyone else's.

each and every row of seats put a table

and put on
an ashtray

that

(Who don't know what I know

in

what proportion,

is

either off, too

much

or on.

Look
or
if that's

it

up, check

too

much,

say, too

time-consuming or whatever other

neat adjective to attach to any

distraction

(for doing nothing at

all.

The rites are care,

less

the natures

something,

of hell simple, the mark the trace of

knows what but

line, trace of

line

made by someone

Ultimate: no

man shall go unattended.

No man shall be an idiot for purely exterior reasons.

22

THE RHYME

There

is

the sign of

the flower
to

borrow the theme.

But what or where

to recover

what is not
too simply.

love

saw her and behind them

and behind her there were

flowers,

nothing.

THE INNOCENCE

Looking to the sea, it is a line of unbroken mountains.

It is It is

the sky.
the ground. There
it.

we live, on
It is

a mist

now

quiet.

tangent to another Here the leaves

come, there
is

the rock in evidence

or evidence.

What I come
is

to

do

partial, partially kept.

THE BALL GAME

The one damn

standing

up
all

to

time (yth inning) someone get a hot

dog

spills

mustard

over me.

The conception
the
hit,

is

whacko!

Likewise out of the park

of our

own indifferent vulgarity,

not

mind you,

that one repents even the most visual

satisfaction.

Early in

life

the line

is

straight

made

straight

against the grain.

Take the

case of myself,

and why not

since these particulars

need

no further impetus,
take

me at the age of

and for some reason

reason.

there,

no matter the particular

The one damn

standing

time (yth inning)

spills

up
all

to

a hot dog someone get

mustard

over me.

THE CARNIVAL
Whereas the man who
the gong disin all
its

hits

proves

it,

simplicity

Even
makes

so the attempt

for triumph, in another man.

Likewise in love

am not foolish or incompetent.

My method is not a
hope

tenderness, but
defined.

26

AFTER LORCA
(or

M.

Marti

The church

is

a business, and the rich

are the business

men.

When they pull on the bells, the

poor come piling in and when a poor man cross, and they rush through the ceremony.
dies,

he has a wooden

rich man dies, they out the Sacrament drag and a golden Cross, and go doucement, doucement

But when a

to the cemetery.

And the poor love it

and think
its

crazy.

27

THE KIND OF ACT OF

who

Giving oneself
to take the

to the dentist or doctor

is

a good one,

complete
is

possession of mind, there

no

giving.

The mind
is

beside the act of any dispossession

lecherous.

when

there

There is no more giving in is no more sin.

28

THE DISHONEST MAILMEN

They are

taking

all

my letters, and they

put them into a

fire.

I see

the flames, etc.

But do not

care, etc.

They burn
I

everything I have, or what have. I don't care, etc.

little

The poem supreme, addressed to

emptiness
this is the

courage

necessary.

This

is

something

quite different.

29

THE CROW
The crow
in the cage in the dining-room

hates me, because I will not feed him.

And I have left nothing behind in leaving

because
I killed

him.

And
there

because
is

I hit
I

him over
at.

the head with a stick

nothing
is

laugh

the hatred of a repentance knowing there is nothing he wants.

Sickness

THE IMMORAL PROPOSITION

If

you never do anything

for

anyone

else

you

are spared the of tragedy

human

relation-

ships.

If
is

quietly

and like another time

there

the

passage of an unexpected thing:

to look at it is

more

than

it

was.

God knows
is

nothing
all

competent nothing there is. The unsure

is

egoist

is

not

good

for himself.

FORW.CW.
The
pleasure of the wit sustains a vague aroma

The fox-glove (unseen)

wild flower

the

To

the hands

come

many

In time of trouble things.

a wild exultation.

APPLE UPPFLE

Vanity (like a belly dancer's romance): just

the hope.

The unafraid & naked

wish, helpless. Pushed against a

huge

& unending door

And while the mind

a
little

more tenuous, more

.

careful of

it,

crabwise, gives in

To the pleasure of a meal in

silence.

33

THE OPERATION
By Saturday
I said

you would be better on Sunday.

a part of a reconciliation.

The

insistence

was

Your eyes bulged, the grey on you, you were hideous. light hung

My involvement is just an old

habitual relationship.

Cruel, cruel to describe what there is no reason to describe.

34

CHANSON

Oh,

le

petit rondelay!

Gently, gently.
It is that I

grow older.

As when
gaily,

for a lark
hoists

one

up a window

shut

many years.
moistlady's eye grow madame's in-

Does the
er, is it

clination,

etc.

Oh,

le

petit rondelay!

Gently, gently.
It is that I

grow older.

DON'T SIGN ANYTHING

Riding the horse as was my wont, there was a bunch of cows in a field.

The horse
chased

them.

I likewise,

an uneasy

accompanist.

To wit,
if

you

lie

the Chinese proverb goes: in a field

and fall
you
will

asleep,

be found in a

field

asleep.

THE CONSPIRACY
You send me your poems,
111

send you mine.

Things tend to awaken even through random communication.

Let us suddenly
proclaim spring.
at the others,
all

And jeer

the others.

I will
if

send a picture too you will send me one of you.

37

KNOW A MAN
As
I

sd to

my
am
John,
I

friend, because I

always talking,

sd,

which was not his

sur-

name, the darkness

rounds
us,

what

we do against it, or else, shall we &

can

why not, buy a goddamn big car,

drive,

he

sd, for

Christ's sake,

look

out where yr going.

THE END
When
I

I know what people think of me am plunged into my loneliness. The grey

hat bought earlier sickens.

I

have no purpose no longer distinguishable.

A feeling like being choked

enters

my throat.

39

THE DEATH OF VENUS

dreamt her sensual proportions

had suffered sea-change,

was a porpoise, a sea-beast rising lucid from the mist.

that she

The sound of waves killed

but there were gestures
of

speech

my own, it was to call her closer,

and
filled

of hers, she snorted

her lungs with water,

then sank, to the bottom,

and looking down,

there I

clear

it

was, like crystal,

saw

her.

40

THE LOVER

What should the young man say, because he is buying

Modess? Should he

blush or not.

Or

turn coyly, his head, to

one

side, as if in

the exactitude of his emotion he

were not offended? Were

proud?
a

Of what? To buy
like that.

thing

A COUNTERPOINT

Let
of

be my own fool own making, the sum of it my

me

is

equivocal.

One says of the drunken farmer:

leave

him lay

off

it.

And

this is

the explanation.

42

WAIT FOR ME

give a

man

his

I said to her,

manliness: provide

what you want I

creature comfort

want only
for

him and
so.

herself:

more

You

preserve essential

think marriage

is

hypocrisies

everything?

in short,

make a

Oh well,
home for herself.
I said.

43

THE BUSINESS

To be in love is like going outside to see

what kind of day

it is.

Do not

mistake me. If you love

her

how prove she

it

loves also, except that

occurs, a remote chance

on

which you stake

But barter
for

yourself?

the Indian was a

means

of sustenance.

There are

records.

44

THE DISAPPOINTMENT
Had you the eyes of a goat,
they would be almond, half-green, halfyellow, an

almond

shape
less as

to

them.

Were you
brush

you

are, cat-like, a

head, sad, sad, un-

goatlike.

45

THE WARNING

For love
split

would

open your head and put

a candle in

behind the eyes.

Love
if

is

dead in us

we forget the virtues of an amulet

and quick
surprise.

A FORM OF ADAPTATION

My enemies came to get me,

among them
a beautiful

woman.

And

god, I thought, this will be the end of me,

I

because

have no

resistance.

Taking

their part against

me even,

flattered that they

I lay

were concerned,

down

before

them and looked up

might help.

soulfully,

thinking perhaps that

And she bent over me to look at me then,

being a woman.

They

And

are wise to send their strongest kissed her.

first, I

thought.

And they watched her and both of us carefully,

not at
all to

be

tricked.

But how account

I trusted
it.

for love, even

if

you look

for it?

47

SONG

Were I myself more blithe,

more the gay cavalier, I would sit on a chair

and blow bubbles

into the

air.

would

tear to

up
me,

all

the checks

made out

not giving a good goddamn what the hell happened.

I would marry a very rich woman who had no use for stoves,

and send my present wife

all

her old clothes.

And see my present children

on Mondays and Thursdays and give them chocolate
to

be nicer

to

me.

If

being the word

it

as

was reported

desperate perhaps, and even foolish,

but god knows useful.

NAUGHTY BOY
When he brings home a whale,
she laughs and says, that's not for real

And if he won

the Irish sweepstakes, she would say, where were you last night?

Where are you now, for that matter? Am

I

always (she says) to be looking

at

you? She
thought

says,
it

if I

would

get any

better I

would shoot you, you

nut, you.

Then pats her hair

and waits
Jim's deep-fired,
all-fat, real

into place,
for

Uncle

gone

whale

steaks.

49

LIKE

THEY SAY
Underneath the
soft grass I sat, I

tree

on some

watched two happy woodpeckers be disturbed by

my presence. And

why
not.

not, I thought to

myself,

why

LA NOCHE
In the courtyard at midnight, at
midnight. The moon locked in itself, to
a
is

man a

familiar thing.

THE WHIP

spent a night turning in bed, my love was a feather, a flat

sleeping thing.

She was

very white

and quiet, and above us on

the roof, there was another

woman I

also loved,

had

addressed myself to in

fit

she

returned.

That
But now

encompasses
lonely,
I

it.

was

yelled,

but what

is

that?

Ugh,

she said, beside me, she put

her hand on

my back, for which act

I

think to say this

wrongly.

ALL THAT

IS

LOVELY IN

MEN
for a

Nothing

dirty

man

but soap in his bathtub, a

greasy hand, lover's nuts

perhaps.

Or else

something like sand with which to scour him

for all that

is

lovely in

women.

1956-1958

JUGGLER'S
for

THOUGHT
David

my

son,

Heads up

to the

sky

people are walking by

in the land with
tails

no heads

hanging

to trees

where truth
reddened by
fields

is

like

an apple

frost

and sun, and the green

go out and out under the sun.

55

A FORM OF

WOMEN
I

have come

far
I

from where
to

enough was not before

have seen the things

in at

looking

me

through the open door

and have walked tonight

by myself
to see the

moonlight
as trees

and

see

it

and shapes more

because
I

fearful

feared

what

did not

know
to

but have wanted

know.

My face is my own, I thought.

But you have seen
I
it

turn into a thousand years.

watched you

cry.

I
I

could not touch you.

wanted very much

to

touch you but could not.

If it is

dark
this is

when
when

have care for

the

given to you, its content

shines.

moon

My face is my own. My hands are my own. My mouth is my own

but
I

am not.

Moon, moon,

when you leave me alone

all

the darkness

is

an utter blackness,
a pit of fear, a stench,

hands unreasonable
never to touch.

But I love you.

Do you love me. What to say

when you
see rne.

57

THEY SAY

Up and down
what falls
goes slower and slower combing her hair.

She is the

lovely stranger

who

married the forest ranger,

the duck and the dog,

and never was seen

again.

THE FRIEND

What I saw in his head

was an inverted and the
vision,

glass cracked

when I put my hand in.

My own head is round

with hair for adornment, but the face
is

an ornament.

Your face

is

wide

with long hair, and eyes

so

wide they grow

I

deep as
If the

watch.

world

could only be rounder,

your head, like mine, with your eyes for real

I

like

lakes!

sleep in myself. a friend,

That man was

sans canoe,

and

wanted

to

help him.

59

PLEASE
for

James Broughton

Oh god, let's go.

This
is

poem for Kenneth Patchen.

Everywhere they are shooting people.

People people people people. This is a poem for Allen Ginsberg.
I

want
is

to

be elsewhere, elsewhere.

This

poem about

a horse that got tired.

Poor. Old. Tired. Horse,

I
I

want

go home. want you to go home.

to
is

This

a
is

poem which
the story.
I

tells

the story,

which
I don't

know.

get

lost.
still

If

only they would stand

and

let

me.

Are you happy, sad, not happy, please come. This is a poem for everyone.

60

THE THREE LADIES

dreamt.

saw three
that I

ladies in a tree,
clearly

and the one

showed her

saw most
me,

favors unto

and

saw up her leg above the knee!

for love

But when the time

was come,

and

of readiness

upon my

had made myself, head and shoulders

I

dropped the other two

like

an unquiet dew.

What were
I

these

two but the one?

saw

in their faces, I heard in their words,

it

wonder of wonders!
they came down

was the undoing

of

me

to see!

Sister,

they said to her

who upon my lap

and we
.

sat complacent, expectant:

he

is

dead in

his head,

have errands, have errands

Oh song of wistful night!

where
it

Light shows

nobody knows, and two are one, and three, to me, and to look
stops
is

not to read the book.

Oh one, two, three! Oh one, two, three!

Three old
ladies sat in

tree.

61

OH NO
If

enough you will come to it and when you get there

they will give you a place to
sit

you wander

far

for yourself only, in a nice chair, and all your friends will be there

with smiles on their faces

and they

will likewise all

have

places.

62

GOODBYE

She stood

at the

window. There was

a sound, a light. She stood at the window.

A face.

Was it that she was looking for, he thought. Was it that she was looking for. He said,
turn from
it,

turn

from

it.

The

pain

is
it.

not unpainful.

Turn from
of

The act of her anger,

the anger she felt then, not turning to him.

THE INTERVIEW
Light eyes would have been more fortunate. They have cares like store windows. All the water was shut off, and winter settled in the house.

The

first

week they wrote

letter.

He wrote it.
She thought about it. Peace was in the house
I

like a

broken

staircase.

was neat about

it,

she later wrote

to a relative in

Spokane.

She spoke in accents low

as she told

me.

A WICKER BASKET

Comes the time when it's later

and onto your table the headwaiter puts the bill, and very soon after
rings out the

sound of

lively laughter

Picking up change, hands like a walrus,

and
and

a face like a barndoor's,

a
size,

head without any apparent nothing but two eyes

So

that's
I

you, man,
as I can,

or me.
I

make it
I

pick up,

faster

go than they

know

Out

the door, the street like a night, any night, and no one in sight, but then, well, there she is,

old friend Liz

And she opens

I step in back,

the door of her Cadillac,

and we're gone. She turns me on There are very huge stars, man, in the sky, and from somewhere very far off someone hands me a
apple pie,

slice of

with a gob of white, white

ice

cream on top of

it,

and

I eat it

Slowly.

And while certainly

and
it, I

at me, they are laughing

all

around

me is racket

of these cats not

making

make it

in

my wicker basket.

65

THE BED

She walks and

in beauty like a lake

eats her steak

with fork and knife

and proves a proper wife.

Her room and board

he can
of
afford,

he has made friends

common

pains

and meets

his ends.

Oh god, decry
such

common
indeed.

finery

as

puts the need

before the bed, makes true the

lie

what

is

66

JUST FRIENDS

Out of
I

the table endlessly rocking,

sea-shells,

and

firm,

saw

a face

appear

which

called

me dear.
half the battle

To be loved
I

is

thought.

To be
is to

be better than

is

not.

Now when you are old what will

You
don't say,

you say?

she said.

That was on

Thursday.

Friday night I left and haven't been back since.

Everything
if

is

water

you look long enough.

THE WIND
Whatever is
to

become of me

becomes daily as the acquaintance with facts is made less the point, and firm feelings are reencountered.
This morning
It is
I

waiting for the biscuits

drank coffee and orange juice, which never came.

my own failing
I

because

cannot make them.

Praise god in

women.

Give thanks to love in homes. Without them all men

would starve

to the bone.
essentially mistaken.

Mother was helpful but

It is
I

the second half of the 2oth century. screamed that endlessly,

it

hearing

back

distorted.

Who comes?
The light footsteps down the hall
betoken
in
in
all

all

her loveliness,

her grimness, in all her asking and staying silent, all mothers or potentials thereof.

There

is

no hymn yet written

I feel

that could

provoke beyond the laughter an occasion for this song

But

as love is long-winded,

the moving
describes

wind
colors

of sound

moving and flight

its

68

AIR:

"CAT BIRD SINGING"

Cat bird singing makes music like sounds coining

at

night.

The
eyes.

trees,

goddamn them,

are

huge

They

watch, certainly, what else should they do? My love

a person of rare refinement,
speaks,

is

and when she

there

is

another

air,

melody
with his

what Campion spoke

of

follow thy fair sunne unhappie shadow

Catbird, catbird.

lady hear me.

have no

other
voice left

THE HERO

Each voice which was asked

spoke
its

words, and heard

more than

that, the fair question, the onerous burden of the asking.

And so

the hero, the

hero! stepped that gracefully into his redemption, losing

or gaining life thereby.

Now we, now I

ask also, and burdened,
tied

down, return
forest also.

and seek the

Go forth, go forth,
grandmother, the of that old form, and turns
saith the
fire

away from the form.

And

the forest
it,

is

dark,

mist hides

trees
I

are dim, but

to

turn

my

father in the dark.

A spark, that spark of hope

which was burned out long
the tedious echo
of the father image
ago,

also wear, old

which only women bear, men, old cares, and turn, and again find
the disorder in the mind.

70

Night

is

dark like the mind,

my mind is dark like the night.

light the light!

Old

foibles of the

right.

Into that

pit,

now pit of
upon your hands,

anywhere, the tears how can you stand

it,

I also turn.

wear the

face, I face

the right, the night, the way, I go along the path

into the last

and only dark,

hearing hero! hero!

a voice faint enough, a spark,

a glimmer grown of old, old fears.

dimmer through

years

THE WAY
My love's manners in bed
are not to be discussed by me,
as
I

mine by her would not credit comment upon

I ride

gracefully.

Yet

by the margin of

that lake in

the wood, the castle,

and the excitement of strongholds; and have a small boy's notion of doing good.

Oh well, I will say here,

let

knowing each man, you find a good wife too, and love her as hard as you can.

THE TRAVELLER

Into the forest again whence all roads depend

this

to lead

way and that him back.

Upon his shoulders

he places boulders,

upon

his eye

the high wide sky.

73

A MARRIAGE

The

first

retainer

he gave to her was a golden

wedding

ring.

The secondlate

at

night

he woke up, leaned over on an elbow, and kissed her.

The

third

and the

last

he died with

and gave up loving

and

lived with her.

74

SHE

WENT TO

STAY
Trying to chop mother down is hunting deer inside Russia with phalangists for hat-pins.
I

like

couldn't.

A FOLK SONG
for Phil

Hitch up honey market race all

the

for the

way

to the plaza!

If

she don't run you can push her like

hell. I

know.

75

BALLAD OF THE DESPAIRING HUSBAND

My wife and I lived all alone,

contention was our only bone. I fought with her, she fought with me,

and things went on

But now
I live

right merrily.

with hardly a

here by myself thing on the shelf, and pass my days with little cheer since I have parted from my dear.

damn

Oh come home soon, I write to her.

Go screw yourself,
I
is

her answer.
turd.

Now what is that, for Christian word?

hope she feeds on dried goose
still I

love her, yes I do. I love her and the children too.

But

only think it fit that she should quickly come right back to me.
I

Ah no, she says, and she is tough, and smacks me down with her rebuff. Ah no, she says, I will not come
after the bloody things

youVe done.
you
true,

Oh wife, oh wife
I

I tell

never loved no one but you. I never will, it cannot be another woman is for me.

That may be
but

right, she will say then, as for me, there's other men.
tell you I propose them firmly by the nose.

And I will
to catch

And I will wear what dresses I choose! And I will dance, and what's to lose!
I'm free of you, you little prick, and I'm the one can make it stick.

Was Was

this the

darling I did love?

this that

mercy from above

did open violets in the spring

and made

my own worn self to sing?

She was. I know. And she is still, and if I love her? then so I will.

And I will

tell

her,

and

tell

her right

Oh lovely lady, morning or evening or afternoon. Oh lovely lady, eating with or without a spoon. Oh most lovely lady, whether dressed or undressed or partly. Oh most lovely lady, getting up or going to bed or sitting only.
Oh loveliest of ladies, than whom none is more fair, more Oh
gracious, more loveliest of ladies, whether

beautiful

you are

just or unjust,

merciful, indifferent, or cruel.

Oh most loveliest of ladies, doing whatever, seeing whatever,

being whatever.

Oh most loveliest of ladies, in rain, in shine, in any weather. Oh lady, grant me time, finish my rhyme. please, to

77

DAMON &

PYTHIAS

When he got into bed,

he was dead

Oh god, god, god, he said.

She watched him take
and kneel there
to look for the
off his shoes

change which had fallen

out of his pocket.

Old Mr. Jones

whom nobody loves

went
to

market for

it,

and almost found

under a
table,

it

but by that time was unable.

And the other day

two men,

who had been known

were said
to

as friends,

be living together again.

IF

YOU

you were going to get a pet what kind of animal would you
If

get.

A soft bodied dog, a henfeathers

and fur

to

begin

it

again.

When the sun goes down and it gets dark

I

saw an animal

in a

park.

Bring it home, to give it to you. I have seen animals break in two.

You were hoping for something

and
loyal

soft

and clean and wondrously careful-

a form of otherwise vicious habit

can have long ears and be called a rabbit.

Dead. Died. Will

die.
I

Want.
asked you

Morning, midnight.
if

you were going to get a pet what kind of animal would you

get.

79

THE TUNNEL

Tonight, nothing time isn't.

is

long

enough-

Were
it

there a

fire,

would burn now.

Were there a heaven,

I

would have gone long

ago.

think that light is the final image.

I

But time
love

reoccurs,

and an echo.

A time passes
love in the dark.

80

THE SAINTS
Heaven won't have to do with There isn't room enough.
its

multitudes.

A thought weVe all had perhaps,

now
taken beyond that consideration.
I

Last night

saw
:

several people

in a dream, in shapes of all of this faces and hands,

and things
I

to say, too.

And I
One
The

love you, one said. love you too. Let's

this.

get out of

said: I

have

to take a piss.

door to the pantry was dark, where the two crouched, his hand on her back, her hand on his back. I looked
at
I

an evil, in the face. saw its place, in the universe, and laughed back

until

my mind cracked.

81

THE NAMES

When they came near,

the one, two, three, four,
all five

of us sat

in the brokeri seat.

Oh glad to see,
oh glad to be, where company
is

so derived
sticks

from

and

stones,

bottles

and bones,

82

A GIFT OF GREAT VALUE

Oh that horse I see so high

when
the world shrinks into
its

relationships,
sees as well as

my
I.

mother

She was born, but I bore with her. This horse was a mighty occasion!

The
of
its

intensity of

its feet!

The height

immense body!

Now then in wonder at evening, at

the last small entrance of the night,

my mother calls it, and I call it my father.

With angry
rights,

face,

with no

with impetuosity and

sterile vision

and a great

wind we

ride.

MY LOVE

It falleth like a stick.

It lieth like air.

It is

wonderment and bewilderment,

to test true.

It is

no thing, but of two,

equal: as the
it

mind

turns to

it,

doubleth,
as

one alone.

Where
few

it is,

there

is

everywhere, separate,
yet
as

dew

to

night

is.

SATURDAY AFTERNOON

It is like a

monster come
table

to dinner,

and the dinner

the
fire

is set,

in the fireplace,

good luck to good

humor

The monster you love is home again,

and he
big
tells

you the

stories of the

world,

cities,

small

men

and women.

Make room for the furry, wooden

monster.

eyed

He is my friend

whom you burn.

Amen.

THE INVOICE

once wrote a

letter as follows:

dear Jim, I would like to borrow

200

dollars

from you

to see

me through,
wrote another: dearest

I also

M/

please come. There is no one

here at all

got

word

today,

viz:

hey

how are you making it? sport, And, why don't you get with it.

86

SOMEWHERE

The galloping collection

are the house

of boards

which

afforded

one evening

to

walk into

just as the night

came down.

Dark
lit

inside, the candle

its

of

own free will,

the
air.

the attic

groaned then, the

led

stairs

me up into

From outside,
a

it
it

must have seemed

wonder

that

was

the inside he as

me saw

in the dark there.

NEW

YEAR'S

The end of the year wears its face

disguises
It is

in the

moon

against the

one would otherwise put upon

it.

the mild temper of midnight that embarrasses us and oh! we turn away into reassuring daylight but backwards.

If it

were the forward motion one wanted

tempers would not be resolved, can one keep the night out
it

What

of

as or

when

it

was there?

Darling (she had gone) answer.

we speak

as

if

there never were an

We speak (to the back, to sleep, to heads). We are alone in the

new minute,
hour, or year, or nowhere.

House. Your hand

is

too far

from me. Tree, speak. The moon

is

white in the branches, the night is white in the mind of it. Love, tell me the time. What time is it? The second, the moment

moving

in the

moon?

Of the

strangeness of bending backwards until the instant of mind in the moon's white
light

mind

is

an

upon an
last

Endless black desert, the sand, in the night of the of the year.

moment

88

SONG
God give you pardon from gratitude
and other mild forms of servitude

and make peace

with what
is

for all of us

easy.

LADY BIRD

A lady asks me
and
I

would

tell

what is

it

she has found the burden

of.

To be happy now she cries, and all

turn backward

things

and

impossible,

God knows

that

love her,

and would comfort her

but the invention

a
parallel

is

sufferance.

Mine for hers,

hers for mine.

90

FOR A FRIEND

Who remembers him also, he thinks

(but
to himself

and

as himself).

Himself alone
in a world of

is dominant no one else.

ENTRE NOUS
If I can't
I

hope then

to hell

with

it.

don't

want
he

to live like this?

Like

this,

said.

Where were you?

of the bureau

She was around in back

where he pushed her?
Hell no, she just
fell.

SING SONG

sing

the song of the sleeping wife,

who married to sleep, who would not sleep simply to get married; who can be up at dawn, yet
never cannot go to sleep if there reason not to go to sleep;
is

good

who sleeps to sleep, who has no other purpose in mind, who wouldn't even hear you if you asked her.

92

AND
A pretty party for people
to

become engaged in, she was

twentythree, he

was
all

hundred and twentyseven times

the times, over and over

and under and under she went

down

stairs,

glass, alabaster,

through doorways, an iron shovel

stood waiting

and
dig

she lifted

it

to

back

and back
father

to

mother,

and

brother,

grandfather and grandmother

are
all

They

dead now.

93

HEROES

In
is

all

those stories the hero

beyond himself into the next

be it those labors thing, of Hercules, or Aeneas going into death.

I

thought the instant of the one humanness

it

in Virgil's plan of

was
yet

that
to

it

was

of course

human enough

to die,
est.

come

back, as

he

said,

hoc opus, hie labor

This
is

That was the Cumaean Sibyl speaking. is Robert Creeley, and Virgil
dead

now two thousand years, yet

all

Hercules

and the Aeneid, yet

that industrious wis-

dom lives in
and the
can

the

way

the mountains

desert are waiting

for the heroes,

still

and death

also

propose the old labors.

94

GOING TO BED

That dim shattering character of nerves which creates faces in the dark
speaks of the heaven and hell as a form of corporate existence.

Oh don't say it isn't so,

think to understand
if

the last time you looked you were still a man.

It is a viscous

form of

self-

propulsion that lets the feet grip

the
floor, as

the head

lifts to

the door,

lurches, ghostwise, out,

and

to

the

window
it

to fall

through,

yet closes

to let

the cat out too.

After that, silence, silence.

On

the floor the hands

find quiet, the

mouth goes
to

lax.

Oh! Look forward

get

back.

Oh wisdom to find fault with what is after all a plan.

95

THE FLOWER

think I grow tensions

like flowers

in a

wood where
goes*

nobody

Each wound is

perfect,

encloses itself in a tiny

imperceptible blossom,

making
Pain
is

pain.

a flower like that one,

like this one, like that one, like this one.

THE LETTER

to

did not expect you stay married to

all

one man

your

life,

no matter you were

his wife.

I thought the pain was endless but the form existent,

as

it is

form,
it.

and

as such I loved

loved you as well even as you might tell,

I

giving evidence
as to

how much was

penitence.

97

THE PLACE

What is the form is the grothe accident tesquerie of the moon's light

on your face.

Oh love, an empty table!

An empty bottle also.
But no
trick will

go

so far but not further.

The end of the year is a division,

a drunken derision

of composition's accident.

We both fell
You fell. In hell we will
I fell.

tell

of

it.

Form's accidents,

we move
.

back-

wards

to love

The movement of
sentence
tells

the

me of you as it was the bottle we drank?

No.
It

was no

accident.

Agh, form is what happens? Form is an accompaniment.

I to love,

you

to love:

syntactic accident.

It will all

come

true,

in a year.

The empty bottle, the empty tell where we were.

table,

THE SOUVENIR

of twisted trees, Passing into the wilderness below the goats and sheep look up at us,
as

we climb

the hill for our picnic

years ago.

99

FOR THE

NEW

YEAR

From something in
looking

the trees

down

at

me
sign

or else an inexact

of a remote

and artificial tenderness

woman who passes me

will not consider

and who

me

things

have

tried to take

with which to make something

like a

toy

for

my children
be quietly forgotten.

and a

story

to

Oh God, send me an omen

that
I

may remember more

see to me,

often.

Keep me,
let

me look.
is

Being unsure, there

the fate

of doing nothing right.

100

THE DOOR
for

Robert Duncan

It is

hard going

to the

door

cut so small in the wall where

the vision

which echoes

loneliness

brings a scent of wild flowers in a wood.

What I understood, I understand.

My mind is sometime torment,

sometimes good and
filled

with livelihood,

and

feels the

ground.

But

see the door,

wall,

and knew the

and wanted the wood,

and would get there if I could with my feet and hands and mind.
Lady, do not banish me for nature digressions. My
is

a quagmire of unresolved

confessions. Lady, I follow.

I left

walked away from myself, the room, I found the garden,

knew the woman we lay down. in it, together

I

Dead night remembers.

In December

we change, not multiplied but dispersed,

sneaked out of childhood,
the ritual of dismemberment.

Mighty magic
in her there
is

is

a mother,

another issue

101

of fixture, repeated form, the race renewal, the charge of the command.

The garden
It is fixed in

echoes across the room.

the wall like a mirror

that faces a

window behind you

and reflects the shadows.

May I go now?

Am I allowed to bow myself down

in the ridiculous posture of renewal, of the insistence of which I am the virtue?

Nothing
Inside

for You is untoward. You would also be tall,

more

tall,

more

beautiful.

Come toward me from the wall, I want to be with You.

So
I

screamed to You,

who hears as the wind, and changes

multiply, invariably, changes in the mind.
to the door, I ran

Running

down

as a clock runs

down. Walked backwards,

near the wall.

stumbled, sat

down

hard on the

floor

Where were You. How absurd, how vicious.

There

My

is nothing to do but get up. knees were iron, I rusted in worship, of You.

For that one sings, one

writes the spring poem, one goes on walking. has always moved to the next town The

Lady and you stumble on

after

Her.

IOZ

The door in

the wall leads to the garden

sit

where in the sunlight

of

the Graces in long Victorian dresses,

which

my grandmother had spoken.

History sings in their faces.

They are young,

they are obtainable,

and you follow after them also in the service of God and Truth.
But the Lady
to the
I will

is

indefinable,

she will be the door in the wall

garden in sunlight.

go on talking

forever.

I will

never get there.

Oh Lady, remember me
who in Your service grows older
not wiser, no more than before.

How can I die alone.

Where will I be
what groans
in this

then

who am now

alone,

so pathetically
I

room where

am alone?

I will I will

go to the garden. be a romantic. I will

sell

myself in hell,
in heaven also I will be.

my mind I see the door, before me across the floor I see the sunlight
In

beckon to me, as the Lady's moves small beyond it.

skirt

THE HILL
It is

sometime since

have been

what it was had once turned me backwards, and made my head into
to

a cruel instrument.

It is

simple

to confess.

Then

done,

to
to

walk away, walk away,

come again.

But that form, I must answer, dead in me, completely, and I wi 1 ! not allow it
is

to reappear

Saith perversity, the willful,

magnanimous which is in me
like a hill.

the

cruelty,

104

1959"

THE AWAKENING
for Charles

Olson

He feels small as he awakens,

but in the stream's sudden mirror,
a pool of darkening water,
sees his size with his

own two eyes.

The

trees are taller here,

fall off to

no field or clearing, and depend on the inswept air for the place in which he finds himself thus
I

lost.

was going on

to tell

you
it

when

the door bell rang

I

was

another story as

know

previously had happened, had occurred.

That was
of the

a woman's impression wonders of the morning, the same whiter air now, and strong breezes

place,

move

the birds off in that

first

freshening.

O wisest of gods! Unnatural prerogatives

would
err to concur,

would fall deafened

between the seen, the green green, and the ring of a far off telephone.

God is no bone of whitened contention. God is not air, nor hair, is not
a conclusive concluding
to

remote yearnings.

He moves
move
to

only as I move, you the awakening, across long rows, of beds, stumble breathlessly, on leg pins and cratch, at all as all men, because you must.

also

moving

107

KORE

As
I

was walking came upon

chance walking
the same road upon.

As

I sat

down
to

by chance
later
if

move

and

as I

might,

light

the

wood was,

and green, light and what I saw

before
I

had not

seen.

It

was

lady

accompanied
by goat

men

leading her.

Her hair held

earth.

Her eyes were dark,

A double flute
made her move.
"Olove,

where
leading

are

you

me now?"

08

THE RAIN

All night the sound had

come back again, and again falls

this

quiet, persistent rain.

What am
that
insisted

I to

myself

must be remembered,

upon
it

so often? Is

that never the ease,

even the hardness,

of rain falling
will

have for

me
this,

something other than

something not so insistent am I to be locked in this

final uneasiness.

Love,
lie

you love me, next to me.

if

Be for me,

like rain,

the getting out

of the tiredness, the fatuousness, the semilust of intentional indifference.

Be wet
with a decent happiness.

109

THE WOMAN

called her across the room,

could see that what she stood on

held her up, and now she came as if she moved in time.

In time to what she moved,

her hands, her hair, her eyes, all things which I took her to be there

by

did

come

along.

It

was not

right

or

wrong
to

but signally despair, to speak to her

as
if

be about

her substance shouted.

no

MIDNIGHT
When the rain stops
cat drops out of the tree
to

and the
walk

away,

when
the

the rain stops, the others come home,

stops,

when

when

phone

the drip of water, the

potential of a caller any Sunday afternoon.

in

THE KID

If it falls flat

I'm used to

it.

Yet

cannot grow
I can't

when

begin again.
to secure

Nowise

what's left to others.

forget.

They

But

remember.

How carelessly ease falls

around me! All the
have
all
it,

trees

the leaves

green!

want
it

to

want

grow in ground to come true

said about
if

too,

what they

you planted

the acorn the tree

would grow.

112

LADY IN BLACK
The mental picture which the
lady in black
if

she be

coming, or going, offered by the occasion

to the

church, behind the

black car, lately stepped out of, and

her dress

falls, lets
all

eyes as

if

people were
looking
see

her

still

an attitude
perplexing.

THE PLAN

Daytime wonder at
the quieter possibilities of slumber,

deep

sleep,

in peace

some place the mind

will yet escape.

Or else,
the
this

truth,

mind
time at
last

trapped:

no

voice,
left.

no

way

The

hand

at last

can tighten.

Why live
in the middle

of this

damned muddle?

Why not
lesser

thing? find out

bring.

what another will

Woman,

addressed,

speaks easily unless

she

is

depressed.

114

Children, wiser,

make

their

own

things unless

thrown under

the way, the

it

way

yesterday, will be also

was

today

and tomorrow.

THE JOKE

There was

a joke
like

went on a walk
over the
these
hill,

and

there before

them

weary

travellers

saw

valleys

and farms
tits

of muscles,

raised

high

in the sky of their vision

which bewildered

them.

They were

no ordinary men but those who come innocent, late and alone
to women and a home, and keep on and keep on walking.

talking

116

THE SONG

It still

makes sense
the song after
all.

to

know

My wiseness I wear
in despair of something better.

I I

am all beggar, am all ears.

Soon everything will be sold and I can go back home

by myself again and try to be a man.

117

THE BIRD

What did you say to me

that
I

had not heard.

She

said she

saw

a small bird.

Where was it.

In a
tree.

Ah, he

said, I

you spoke

to

thought me.

118

YELLOW

He wants to be an Indian,
someone
or black
else a

white man,

man, pacing
simply given.

this to a reason

What do

they put in the graves of

dissatisfied

men?

What for the women who denied them, changing

their colors into

greens, reds, blues,

yellow.

Her hands were

yellow, her eyes were

yellow.

The

Indians want

her to be their queen because she is such a

lovely color.

119

THE CRACKS

Don't step
so lightly.

Break

your back, missed the step. Don't go

away mad, lady in the nightmare. You

are central,

even necessary.
I will

attempt to describe you.

I will

be completely without
all left.

face, a lost

chance, nothing at

'Well," he said
as

he was leaving,

"blood
tells."

But you remembered quickly other times, other faces,

and

slipped between the good

intentions, breathlessly.

What a good
wants
to.

boy am Will you,

who

won't you.

mother, come quickly, Why not

go quietly, be left with a memory

or an insinuation or

two

of cracks in a pavement.

120

JACK'S

BLUES

I'm going to

it, put an elephant in the pot. I'm going out and never come back.

roll up and smoke a monkey

What's better than

that.

Lying on your back, flat on your back with your

eyes to the view.

Oh the view is blue, I saw that

too, yesterday

and you,

red eyes and

blue,

funked.

I'm going to roll up a rug and smoke it, put

the car in the garage and I'm a sad old candle. gone, like

121

OUT OF SIGHT
He thinks
always things
will be

simpler,

with face

of a

down
mouth
down, then

so that the
rolls

the eye shuts

as a
to

fist

hold patience,

patience,

in the locked mind.

122

A TOKEN

My lady
fair

with

soft

arms, what

can

say to

you

words, words

as if all

worlds were there.

THE MAN

He hie fie finger

speak in simple sound
feels

much

better

lying down.

He toes is broken
all

he foot go

rotten

now.

He look

he hurt bad, see

danger
all

around he

no see before

come down on him.

124

THE MEMORY

Like a river she was,

huge roily mass

of water

tree trunks carrying and divers drunks.

Like a

Priscilla,

a feminine Benjamin,

a whore gone right over the falls,

she was.

Did you know her. Did you love her, brother. Did wonder pour down
on the whole goddamn town.

125

TO AND

To and
back and forth,
direction
is

a third

or simple fourth of the intention

like
it

goes and goes.

No
more snow
winter?
this

No more snow.
Then what replaces
all

the faces,

wasted, wasted.

126

A WISH

So much
to

rain

make

the

mud again,
also.

trees

green

and flowers

The water which

ran

up

the sun

and down
it is

again, the same.

A man of supple
yielding

manner

might, too, discover

ways of water.

127

SONG

What I
grew
in

took in
weight.
it

my hand
You must

understand

was not obscene.

Night comes.

We sleep.

Then
say
it.

if

you know what

Don't pretend.
Guises are

what enemies wear. You

and
I live

in a prayer.

Helpless. Helpless,

should

speak.

Would you. What do you

think of me.

No woman ever was,

was wiser
than you.

None is

more

true.

But

fate, love, fate

scares
I

me.

What

took in
in

my hand
weight.

grows

128

THE SIGN BOARD

The quieter

the people are

the slower the time passes

until there
sitting

is

in the

a solitary man of silence. figure

Then scream at him,

come here you
idiot
it's

going

to

go

off.

A face that is no face

hut the features, of a face, pasted

on

a face until that face

is faceless,

answers by

a being nothing there

where there was

man.

129

NOT NOW
can see you,

hairy, extended, vulnerable,

but how did you get up there. Where were you going all alone,

why
to

didn't

you wait

for the others to

come home

go too, have gone with you.

they would

130

THE TIME

They walk in and fall

into

the large crack in the floor with the room upended on side
to

make

the floor a wall.

Upwards
they
fall

or

downwards now

into the crack,

floor
to,

having no

or ceiling to refer

what time comes

to,

the place it all goes into. All that was an instant ago
is

gone now.

SONG

Those rivers run from

to sea.

that land

The wind
move,

finds trees to

then goes again.

And me, why me

on any day might be
favored with kind prosperity
or sunk in wretched misery.
I

cannot stop the weather

by putting together myself and another

to

stop those rivers.

Or hold
with
the

the

wind
the tree,

my hand from

the thing, love from her or me.

mind from

Be

natural, while alive.

to that

Dead, we die
also,

and go another
I

course,

hope.

And me, why me

on any day might be
favored with kind prosperity or sunk in wretched misery.

You

want back

of

me
here,

in the life

we have
of
it.

waiting

to see

what becomes

Call, call loud,

I

will hear you, or

if

not me, the wind will

for the sake of the tree.

132

THE RESCUE
The man
to a
sits

in a timelessness

with the horse under him in time

movement of legs and hooves

timeless sand.

upon a

Distance comes in from the foreground time present in the picture as

he reads outward from

and comes from

that beginning.

A wind blows in
and out and and runs
all

about the

man

as the horse ran

to

come

in time.

A house is burning in the sand. A man and horse are burning.

The wind is burning.
They
are running to arrive.

'33

THE PARADOX
Looking down
long hair,

at

her

we saw
in

the position
her.

which we placed

Yet our

own
up down

a formula, the street

she walked
she looked

on.

'34

THE END OF THE DAY

Oh who is
so cosy with

despair
all,

and

they will

not come,
rejuvenated, to the last spectacle
of the day. Look!

the sun
sinking,
it's

is

now

gone. Night,

good and sweet

night,

good

night, good, good

come. night, has

135

THE WOMEN

"What he holds
is

to

a cross
that

and by just
is

much

his load increased/'

"Yet the eyes cannot die in a face

whereof the hands

are nailed in place/'
*
"I

wish

might grow
a tree

tall like

to

be cut

down
such beauty."

to bear

FOR FEAR

For fear
to

want

make myself again

under the thumb

of old love, old time

subservience

and

pain, bent into a nail that will

not come out.

Why, love, does it

make such
a difference

not to be heard
in spite of self

or

what we may

feel,

one for the

but as a

other,

hammer

to drive again

bent nail
into old hurt?

'37

THE GIFT
He hands
down
the gift as from a great
height,
his

precious

understanding clothed in miraculous

fortitude.

This

is

the present

of the ages, all

rewards
in
itself.

But the ladyshe, disdainful, all

in white for

this occasion

cries
is

out petulantly,
that that
all, is
all.

138

THE HOUSE
for Louis

Zukofsky

Mud put
upon mud,
lifted

to

make room,

house
a cave,

and
colder night.

To sleep
in, live in,

to

come

in

from heat,

all

form derived

from kind,
built

with that in mind*

139

YOUNG WOMAN

Young woman, older woman, as soon as the

words begin, you
leave, rightly.

How pace yourself behind,

how follow when it is you also who leads, to be
followed,

and why

not.

Is there a

patience
barely, hardly,

we learn,

a condition into which

are suspended?

we

Is there a

place for us,

do you know it well

enough
it

that without

thought

can be found?

I think,

and

therefore I am not, who was to have been,

as

you,

something

else.

140

THE POOL

My embarrassment at his nakedness,

at the

pool's edge,

and

my wife, with his,

was a freedom

standing, watching
this

not given

me who am

more naked,
less

contained
flesh

by my own white and the ability

to take

quietly
to

what comes

me.

The

sense of myself

separate,

grew

a white mirror
in the quiet water

he breaks with

his

hands

and

feet, kicking,

pulls

up

to

land
feet

on the edge by the

of these

women who must know

that for each

man is a speech
describes him,

makes

the day grow white

and

sure, a quietness of water

in the mind,
lets

hang, descriptive

as a risk, for

something
find

which he cannot

a means or time.
141

AIR:

'THE LOVE OF A

WOMAN"

The love of a woman

is

the possibility

which

surrounds her as hair

her head, as the love of her

follows
her.

and describes
if
is

But what

they die,
still

then there

the aura

left, left

sadly,

but

hovers in the

air, surely,

where

this

had taken place?

of her, of

Then
it

sing,

whom

will

be

said,
it

he

sang of her,

was the

song he made which made her happy, so she lived.

142

MIND'S HEART

Mind's heart, be that some

in you.

it

must

truth lies locked

Or else, lies, all lies, and no man true enough to know

the difference.

THE NAME

Be natural,
wise
as

you can be,

my daughter,
let

my name
flesh

be in you
I

gave you

in the act of

loving your mother,

all

your days her ways, the woman in you

brought from sensuality's measure,

no other,
there

was no thought

of

it

but such
all

pleasure

women

must be in
as you.

her,

But not wiser,

not more of nature

than her hair,

the eyes she gives you.

There will not be another

woman such as you

are.

Remember

your mother,

144

the

way you

the days of waiting.

Be natural,
daughter, wise
as
all

you can

be,

my daughters,
men

be women
for

when that time comes.

Let the rhetoric
stay with me your father. Let

me talk about it,

saving you such
vicious self-

exposure, let you

pass it on in you. I cannot be more than the

man

who watches.

THE FIRST TIME

We are given a chance,

among
the worst something left
otherwise, hopeful

circumstance.

As

spoke to you,

once,
I

loved you

as simply as that.

Now to go back,
I

cannot

but going on, will not forget the

first

time.

You likewise
with

me must be
indifference.

testament
to

pain's

We are only careful

for such a

memory, more

careful, I think,

than

we ever thought to be.

146

THE FIGURES
The stillness
of the wood,

the figures formed

by hands so
to

still

they touched

it

be one

hand holding one

hand, faces

without eyes,
bodies of
stone, so

wooden
still

they will not

move

from that quiet

action ever
again.

Did the man

who made them find

a like quiet? In the act of making

them

it

must have been

still

so

he heard the wood

with his hands

and

felt it

moving

into

the forms

he has given

to

them,

one by singular
one, so quiet, so still.

THE ROSE
for

Bobbie

Up and down
she walks,
form, a
listless

movement

quietly misled.

Now,
to

speak to her.

"Did you want

go,

then

why

don't you."

She went. There were

things she left
in the
as a

room
it.

form of

He follows,

walking.

Where do they walk now? Do they talk now

where they are
in that other place

grown monstrous,
quiet quiet air as breath.

And all about a rosy

mark
discloses

her nature
to

him, vague and unsure.

here roses,

There

roses,

flowers, a pose of

nature, her

nature has disclosed to him.

Yet breathing, crouched

in the dark,

he is there
also, recovers,

to bring her

back

to herself, himself.

The room wavers,

wavers.

And as if,
as
if

a cloud

had

broken at last

open

and all the rain from that, from that had fallen

on them,
on them there
is

mark

of her nature, her flowers,

and his room, his nature, to come home to.

149

THE EYE
Moon
and
clouds, will

we drift
higher than that
look
at,

we

moon's and
mind's
eye.

150

LOVE COMES QUIETLY

Love comes
finally,

quietly,

drops

about me, on me,

in the old ways.

What did I know

thinking myself
able to go alone all the way.

AFTER MALLARM

Stone,
like stillness,

around you

my

mind sits, it is
a proper form
for
it,

like

stone, like

compression
fixed fast,

itself,

without a sound.

152

THE PEOPLE
Wistful,

they speak of
satis-

faction, love

and

divers

other
things. It

comforts,

it

surprises

them, the
old

remembrances,
like

hands

to

hold them

and warm. So
safe

must it be, then, some god looks

truly

down

upon them.

THE WIFE

know two women

and the one
tangible substance,
flesh

is

and bone.

The other in my mind

occurs.

She keeps her

strict

proportion there.

But how should

propose with two such creatures

in

to live

my bed

or

how shall he who has a wife

two
to

yield

one
die.

and watch the other

154

THE SNOW
The broken snow
should leave the traces

of yesterday's walks, the paths and bring friends to our door

worn

in,

somewhere in the dark winter.

Sometime in April
I will

get at last

the flowers promised you long ago, to think of it

will help us through.

The night is a pleasure to us,

I

think sleeping, and what

warmth

secures

me you bring,
giving at last freely of yourself.

Myself was old, was confused, was wanting,to sing of an old song,
through the
last

brought

now

echo of hurting, home.

'55

FIRE

Clear smoke,

fire

in the far off

haze of summer,

burning somewhere.

What is
a lonely heart for if not
for itself alone.

Do the questions
answer themselves,
all

wonder
to a

brought

reckoning?

When you are done,

I

am done,
it

then

seems that

one by one

we
to

can leave

it all,

go on.

FOR FRIENDSHIP

For friendship

make
to

a chain that holds,

to

be bound

others,

two by two,

a walk, a garland,

handed by hands
that cannot

move

unless they hold.

157

THE GESTURE

The gesture she makes

to rise,
all

her flesh

is

white,

and died.

Now morning, now

night,

and sun

shines as

moonlight.

Sun, for her

make do
light

with bright

moon and
love

and children

sleeping,

in her died

mind's keeping.

FOR LOVE
for

Bobbie

Yesterday

wanted

to

speak of it, that sense above the others to me

important because
that I

all

know derives
it

from what

teaches me.
is it

Today, what
is

that

finally so helpless,

different, despairs of its

own

statement, wants to

turn away, endlessly to turn away.

If the

moon

did not

no,
I

if

you did not

wouldn't either, but what would I not

do,

what prevention, what

thing so quickly stopped.

That is love yesterday

or tomorrow, not

now. Can

eat
I

what you give me.

have not earned
I
it.

Must

think of everything

as earned.

Now love also

becomes a reward so remote from me I have made it with my mind.

only

Here is tedium,
despair,

a painful

159

sense of isolation

and

whimsical

if

pompous

self-regard.
is

But that image

to

only of the mind's

vague structure, vague because it is my own.

Love, what do I think
to
say.
I

me

cannot say it

What have you become to ask,

what have
I

made you into,

crossed
soft

companion, good company, with skirt, or legs

body under

the bones of the bed.

Nothing says anything but that which it wishes

would come

true, fears

what

else

might happen in

some other place, some

other time not this one.

A voice in my place, an
echo of that only in yours.
Let

me stumble into

not the confession but

the obsession I begin with

now. For you

also (also)

some time beyond place, or place beyond time, no

mind left

to

say anything at

all,

that face gone, now.

Into the
it all

company of love

returns*

160

122345