FCF 87

For
instance: A
word of a

single
vowel could
become a circle

Two
vowels, a
rectangle     Three vowels,

a
triangle      Four
vowels, a square

Five
vowels, a
five-point star

Six
vowels, a
six-point star

and
so on…
Our noiseless angles

go
bent. We
eat our soup

at
a table
scattered with dead

ladybugs.
I can’t write
doorknob, or cell

phone,
without making
it sound as

if
I’m looking
for a church.

Cruise ships are delusional. Not the passengers, the ships themselves. This lambkin is sheared and encased in ice. The ice is encased in plexiglass. A bunch of wires … little grayish floaters in my visual field. But I would like to neglect such issues. I murder people for money, don’t you think?? “We” have surpassed post-modernism, leaving it behind, while embracing a new world philosophy, called ‘Fish Fry’, which is much more beneficial, in terms of the common chemistry of things coming apart--

you
know, that
friendly, social warmth,

the
toilet backed
up because it

had
to. Hold
out your hand.

Now
tighten the
muscles in your

forearm –
not a
lot, just enough

to
be aware
that it’s tensed.

Hold
it. Permanently.
You don’t notice

it
for a
while and then,

it
becomes just
an ache. After

a
couple of
days, it’s sore

and
after a
week or two,

it’s
not a
light tensing anymore,

it’s
a clench
and it lets

you
know all
the time how

much
it hurts.
And it travels.

It
starts to
ripple to the

rest
of you,
giving you jolts

of
electricity flashing
like lightning through

random
muscles: pain
that is almost

exquisite
in its
clarity and tone. Version:1.0 Start:Yes End:No Start:Yes End:No Start:Yes:Runendless: scale234 5full-fledged hellhound I
began this bit

with
“Hold
out your hand.

Now
tighten the
muscles in your

forearm –
not a
lot, just enough

to
be aware
that it’s tensed.

Hold
it. Permanently.”
As if the

tensing
had ever
been optional. “In

reality, didn’t we fall by the wayside
in order to save God
from the trouble of saving people?”

No,
but I
know why you

think
so. I
was born in

a
year ending
0 or 1

so
I read
“Metal” -helps water but hinders wood; helped by earth but hindered by fire

he used to be totally dull-colored
because he came from the earth’s inside
now he has become a super-conductor
for cold words, hot pictures and light itself
       all being transmitted through his throat

one
large bruise
four inches below

right
knee inflicted
by old growth

stump
of western
red cedar, skat

pellets
the size
of Atomic Fireballs.

Right
about now
you must be

thinking,
“Is her
life an effin’

telenovela?
What do
you mean, Oh

Busy
Abogado, that
you have time

to
go down
to the garden

to
hack up
the rhubarb?!!!!”

my
mother, smiling
euphorically, smoothed the

aluminum
foil over
the pillow. When

it
rained, hours
into our long

journey
to America,
I saw citron-

yellow
flashes. I
reached my little

hand
out further
into the environment.

First
thing today,
she shot up dye,

he
had his
blood drawn. The

animals
in this
village will have

no
dreams. She
believes her word-

bearing
matrix lies
in her underbelly.

What
I could
see of her

was
wrapped in
steam. What is

your
itinerary? How
long are you

staying?
The old
myths are wrestling

with
the new
myths, the new

myths
are mud
wrestling with surfers,

yogis,
and cyborgs.
The creamy nymphs

are
singing: Tra
la la.          Hee

hee,
ha ha
ha’s whirl like

microscopic
jewels ‘round
“algorithmic suburbs”. No

need
much for
words, whistling maybe,

or
whistling along,
it’s either

Aim
Straight and
Press Vaporize, or

what would happen if I just snipped
the sides of this enclosure? If I just refused

to cook myself today? No matter how doughy,
I know there’s blood inside.

[Note: Sources: I start with Drunken Boat 10, 4 sections, jumping around from section to section according to a “loose associational logic” (Robert Kelly), taking two items from one section, then two from another, etc. I intersperse bits taken from authors at Ron Silliman’s 13 Jul 09 Recently Arrived list, attempting if possible to intersperse between Drunken Boat sections. The 1st of a series? I begin with mis/Translations, taken in reverse order. George Orrimbe, “Vocalo-coloriste Portraiture”; Michel Clavel “Traduction Homographique (Français / Anglais)”. Kathleen Sheeder Bonanno, “Ladybugs”, at Alice James Books (Silliman); Over to Poetics, again in reverse order. Corey Zeller, “Dissolving Over Steel Railings, Un-Drawn Windows, the Language below Bridges, in Advent”; Joseph Woods, “Mobile, Late April”. Juliet Cook, “Sieve”, “Ghost Teeth”, Letizia Merello, self-description, at Turntable & Blue Light (Silliman). On to Greatest Hits, starting with issue 1. Jennifer Coates, “Consistency”; Patrick Donnelly, “Dust”. Cheryl Dumesnil, “Don’t Ask Me”, at The Cortland Review. Lene Anderson, “Like Glass” (a description of fibromyalgia pain K sent me, to give me a sense of what she lives with every day). On to Arts in Asia, reverse order again: Can Yücel, “Poem Forty-Four” (tr. Talât Sait Halman); Changming Yuan, “Chinese Chimes: Science or Superstition: The Ancient Theory of the Five Elements Accounts for Us All”. Alison Hawthorne Deming, “SPECIMENS COLLECTED AT THE CLEAR CUT”, from “The Andrews Forest Quartet”, at Alison Hawthorne Deming.com (Silliman). From here on I intersperse 6 bits from Eileen Tabios’ new arrivals list, 11 Jul 09, “He Hacked Up the Rhubarb!...?...!”. 8 Drunken Boat bits plus 6 Chatelaine new arrival bits = a sonnet. Well, that was the plan … Eileen Tabios; David Buuck, Ruts; Bhanu Kapil, “19. SOFT CRAZINESS: VISUAL MEMORIES, POST-OP”, at J’s Theater; Sasha Steensen, “Wintery Weather and Job Slaughter”, at Starting Today: poems for the first 100 days; Eric Baus, “A Scared Text”, “The Tranquilized Tongue”, at Fascicle 1; Filip Marinovich, “Honorable One”, at Eoagh 3; blurb for Elizabeth Marie Young, Aim Straight and Press Vaporize, and Young herself, as quoted by Ange Mlinko, “Two Chapbooks”, at Harriet; Keith Tuma, “’till mute attention Struck my listning Ear”, at Jacket 26]

Comments

[Bob]

I tried that thing with the tightening of the muscles in the forehead...

[John Bloomberg-Rissman]

Did yr brain explode?