As
The old
Greek said, “We
Walk
On the
Faces of the
Dead.”
The mountaintop
Of Mt. Diablo
Has
One of
The most expansive
Vistas
In the
World. A reductio
Ad
Absurdam of
A closed system.
To
Live amid
The great vanishing
As
A shadow
Must live. This
Simone
Weil called
Prayer. Arnold Schoenberg
Liked
The piece.
Two figures appeared,
Barefoot,
Dressed in
Overalls, with taped
Mouths.
One pulled
The other to
The
Pavement and
Drew a forensic
Line
Around the
Body. This figure
Was
In turn
Pulled to the
Ground
By the
One who had
Been
Lying prone,
And so the
Process
Continued. [Sortes
Virgilianae: year in
Year
Out, the
Urn stands ready,
The
Fateful lots
Are drawn (Book
Six,
Early, Fagles
Translation). Interpolation fourteen]
The
Untranslatable thought
Must be the
Most
Precise, immense.
This piece was
Written
During my
Los Angeles period.
And
So the
Process continued, in
A
Chain, one
Figure’s fall becoming
The
Other’s rise,
And vice-versa.
More
Briefly, try;
But stymied, give
It
Up, do
Something else. Thicken
The
Plot. Dance.
The feet were
Naked
And vulnerable,
Yet they had
The
Strength. They
Dragged along the
Doc
Martens like
Laughing laceless puppets.
And
As for
Senzaki, he died
In
Obscurity, an
Old dishwasher, with
Few
Friends, a
Kind of parable,
Lost
Bells, lost
Bells (echo). The
Resulting
Video is
A complex and
Poignant
Work, which
Is more Radiation
Than
Power Path,
More Doom. A
Sigh
Than Spared
By Civilization and
Mass
Media. Obviously,
However, the eye
Is
Part of
The body. And
It
Was an
Amusing sight to
See
These old
People shuffle about
In
Dust … still
As they put
It,
This place
Was perfect for
Pebbles,
So rich
With rounded stones,
Transcendent
Thought, body,
Senses, mind, emotions
Everything,
The moment
Of transition from
Optical
To bodily
Sensation, the world’s
Largest
Replica of
A butterfly tongue,
The
World’s greatest
Greatest, that you
Waver
Constantly between
Contradiction and meaning,
A
Sense of
Beauty and anxiety.
So
That this
Kiss, she said,
Might
Shiver out
To the end
Of
The world,
Shimmer outward into
What
Has no
Opposite, the primitive
Voice
Of the
Dream-like beginning,
The
Deep mystical
Deep, the naked
Liquid
Rippling extraordinary,
The sleep of
Words
Towards which
The poem sees,
The
Gently screaming
Nocturnal lux aeterna,
The
Cloud of
Quiet wild. As
You
Move around
Your face is
Very
Lightly brushed
By single strands
Of
Hair hanging
From the beams.
Then
Full moon
Skunk appears / delightful /
With
Tiny frightful
Screams. Musically exactly
On
The same
Plane as a
Pencil.
Meanwhile the
Strands of hair
Gently
But insistently
Catch in your
Mouth.
The hair
Gets to you.
And
Some people
Blinded by this
Magical
Hokum-pokum
And those far-
Off
Peaks shining
Pure and rare,
Timeless
Cultural artifacts,
Sometimes have their
Own
Material, a
Wedge-shaped sign
Of
A space
For silence whose
Duration
Is entirely
Open and variable.
Why
Not sneeze?
The hair gets
Say
What? I’m
Going to be
Cool
And soften
The dreadful oh
Ick
I have
In my heart,
Wanting
To be
As close to
Nature
Poetry as
Possible. The most
Delicate,
Eroticized and
Lasting of human
Materials
Is also
Considered unclean. Anna
Freud:
When traced
Back to their
Source,
Displacements of
Feeling reveal themselves
As
Based on
Early childhood events
When
The loser
Was himself “lost”,
That
Is, felt
Deserted, rejected, alone,
And
Experienced in
Full force as
His
Own all
The painful emotions
Which
He later
Ascribes to the
Objects
Lost by
Him. “I’m sure
I
Cleaned this
Space just a …
And
Now, in
No time, it’s
Full
Of cobwebs?”
Wondered the woman
Taking
Care of
The large room.
The
Infinite space
Between dendrites. The
Ordinary
Drop of
Calm light of
The
Roar of
The black walls.
One
Day Henry
Went to the
Stand
For some
Vegetables. “Little did
I
Know that
The man I
Was
Buying asparagus
From was a
Master
Shakuhachi player.”
Thus began a
Long
Friendship. “Every
Force evolves a
Form” –
Strangely enough
These words do
Not
Come from
Hatoum herself, nor
From
A theoretician
Of aesthetics, but
From
Mother Ann
Lee (1736-84),
The
Founder of
The Shaker Sect
In
America. [Art
Is life and
Life
Is transformation,
The supreme goal
Of
The traveler
Being to remain
In
Ignorance of
His [yes] destiny
(Youssef
Ishagpour, in
Tàpies, Works, Writings,
Interviews:
Interpolation fifteen)]
((Λ Λ Λ
Λ
Λ Λ
Λ Λ Λ
Λ
Λ Λ
Λ Λ Λ))
Homage
To Charlie
Parker. Absorb the
Atmosphere
And share
The activities. [An
Old
Culture with
A luminous tradition
And
Expression, at
The origin of
Which
Is Ramon
Llull, The Enlightened
Doctor,
As he
Was known, creator
Of
The language:
Silence, the night,
The
Dark face
Of the world,
Infinite
Empty spaces,
The elements of
Everyday
Life. Box
Of strings.] Silence
Is
A roar
With hands. You
Are
Still here.
The pièce de
Résistance
Of the
Evening. Empty enormous
Empty
Empty enormous
Empty. [Rooted in
The
Earth, part
Plant, part animal,
In
A playful
Atmosphere of panic
And
Feverish, elated
Sexual large eyes,
Lengths
Of yarn,
And string, rings,
Rice,
Newspaper, silver
Foil, toilet paper.
Incised
In the
Rock. Graffiti. (End,
Interpolation
Fifteen)] Even
Dada failed. Peace.
Hair
And air.
They stir lightly.
Therefore,
Be it
Enacted by the
Senate
And House
Of Representatives of
The
United States
Of America in
Congress
Assembled, Mud,
Water, Fire, Blackness,
Sight
And Unknown.
The Key to
Songs.
A haptic
Rather than optical
Perception.
Multi-dimensional
Relations to a
World
Where “threatening”
Difference is mitigated
And
Negotiated. You’re
All just a
Box
Of crayons.
The appearance of
A
Comet. One
Comment I really
Liked
Was when
A group of
Builders,
Standing having
Their lunch break,
Said,
“What the
Hell is happening
Here?”
And this
Black woman, passing
By
With her
Shopping, said to
Them,
“It’s obvious.
She’s being followed
By
The police.”
Be it enacted:
The
Whole ball
Of wax would
Make
A lovely
Crayon decorator candle
On
A Day
Of the Dead
Santeria
Petro Voudou
Altar. Be it
Enacted:
An out-
Of-whack music
Box.
An orbiting
Ball of dust.
“The
Color of
Face and the
Warmth
Of body,
The light of
Heart
And eye.”
Simultaneous dimensions. Contrapuntal.
[Another
Unbidden interpolation.
13 November: there
Is
A rabbit’s
Severed head on
The
Sidewalk in
Front of our
Toledo
Hotel. 15
November: “Mis pasos
En
Esta calle /
Resuenan / en otra
Calle /
Donde / Oigo
Mis pasos / Pasar
En
Esta calle /
Donde / Sólo es
Real
La niebla”
(Octavio Paz). My
Steps
In this
Street sound in
Another
Street where
I hear them
Echo
In this
Street where all
That’s
Real is
The fog (tr.
Sam
And John
B-R). The
Paz
Is painted
On the wall
Of
Our hotel
Room in Madrid]
Sky
Fall down.
We are here
In
A tree
With a wire
Star.
Nearly translucent.
Sky fall down.
$1
Will get
You history. History,
You
Seem a
Tiny wrecked thing.
In
The night
And at the
Fading.
Massacres in
The camps. Could
You
Elaborate on
That? Buddha’s ears
Are
Droopy. We
Are here in
Our
Skin. “Flowers
For ritual or
Medicine.”
Away alone
A last a
Loved
Along the
[Sólo es real].
A
“Celebratory / destabilizing
Framework.” Complicating patterns.
We
Are here
In our skin.
I
Rush my
Only into your
Arms.
Loud heap
Miseries upon us.
Nightmare:
I went
To Beirut looking
For
My parents.
In the wreckage
Of
Their home
I found two
Plastic
Boxes. The
Blue box was
Full
Of tiny
Toy soldiers that
Exploded
Becoming a
Cloud of flies
[A
Rabbit’s severed
Head. La niebla].
[Note: Sources: Sam Hamill, Jane Hirshfield, Lawson Fusao Inada, Robert Kelly, Joanne Kyger, Michael McClure, Harryette Mullen, Hoa Nguyen, in The Wisdom Anthology of North American Buddhist Poetry (ed. Andrew Schelling); liner notes to Terry Riley, Requiem for Adam; Lou Harrison, Rhymes With Silver; Kronos Quartet, Black Angels; George Crumb, Songs, Drones and Refrains of Death; Christian Wolff, (complete music for violin & piano); Rachel Rudich's collection Henry Cowell: The Universal Flute; Morton Subotnick, Return and The Key to Songs; Stephen Albert, To Wake The Dead; Mona Hatoum (ed. Michael Archer, Guy Brett, Catherine de Zegher)]