LITMIR.BIZ

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      Love is not worth so much;

      I regret everything.

      Now on our backs

      in Fayetteville, Arkansas,

      the stars are falling

      into our cracked eyes.

      With my good arm

      I reach for the sky,

      and let the air out of the moon.

      It goes whizzing off

      to shrivel and sink

      in the ocean.

      You cannot weep;

      I cannot do anything

      that once held an ounce

      of meaning for us.

      I cover you

      with pine needles.

      When morning comes,

      I will build a cathedral

      around our bodies.

      And the crickets,

      who sing with their knees,

      will come there

      in the night to be sad,

      when they can sing no more.

The Tryst

      In the early evening rain

      I leave the vault

      and walk into the city

      of lamentations, and stand.

      I think it is September, September.

      Where are you, Josephine?

      It is one minute until you must appear,

      draped in a grass-green serape,

      shorter than most people,

      more beautiful, baleful …

      pressing a hand to my forehead,

      slipping into my famished pocket

      the elixir, the silver needle.

Pity Ascending with the Fog

      He had no past and he certainly

      had no future. All the important

      events were ending shortly before

      they began. He says he told mama

      earth what he would not accept: and I

      keep thinking it had something to do

      with her world. Nights expanding into

      enormous parachutes of fire, his

      eyes were little more than mercury.

      Or sky-diving in the rain when there

      was obviously no land beneath,

      half-dead fish surfacing all over

      his body. He knew all this too well.

      And she who might at any time be

      saying the word that would embrace all

      he had let go, he let go of course.

      I think the pain for him will end in

      May or January, though the weather

      is far too clear for me to think of

      anything but august comedy.

Pride’s Crossing

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      I recognize her hand.

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      her hair is as intricate as a thumbprint.

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      her name is the threshold of sleep.

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      it takes all night to get there.

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      you have stepped over the barrier.

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      you will understand afterwards.

      Where the railroad meets the sea,

      where the railroad meets the sea—

      I know only that our paths lie together,

      and you cannot endure if you remain alone.

The Indian Undertaker

      There is a man carrying an armload of lilacs

      across the field: he may be a lost Indian

      as he is whistling, very beautifully, a tune

      to the birds I have never heard. I am in back

      of him, following at a distance. Three small quail,

      perhaps hypnotized, rise and circle his head.

      I want to stop the man and ask him what he said

      to make them feel so safe, but I feel

      weak and dizzy. His whistling begins to chill

      my neck, as if the wind from his lips were

      rushing round me. If only I were agile

      like this family of field mice heading for

      the river; still, I am not sorry I came here.

      A lilac is falling like a piece of sky

      from his arms; it seems to take ten minutes or more.

      Finally it kisses the wet earth. I

      start running—the lilac is waiting for me.

      Here you are! I feel the first emotions of love.

      And, look, a snail is holding on to your leaf

      for all he’s worth. So slowly he moves,

      humming a psalm to the god of snails.

      The lilac swoons. The ground is sapphire

      and the trees are topaz. I feel as if I were

      attending my own funeral, the air a jail

      of music and cool yellow fire.

The Initiation

      The long wake continues,

      quiet and moronic expressions.

      The jowl of the dead

      is agape with infinite abandon

      as if he were about to sing:

      if we concentrate

      he may remember the words.

      In comes a man with a dog

      on a chain; then several others.

      The room is bathed

      in plaster of paris.

      In the background

      a deep, abundant fugue has begun.

      The piece is dedicated

      to me. How strange,

      I thought I was new here.

      They stop playing,

      file quickly into another room.

      As I begin to leave

      shafts of darkness reach out

      and close the little door.

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