The Breath of Life

The Breath of Life

        "... and hold her / till she is awake again."
        Eric Dutton's "Staying Married"

After church
we lie together on the narrow futon
and I am wrapped around you
like a thin tree snake holding a pregnant dove--
the look of peace in your eyes
is so gentle, your soul so clear that
the tears come to my eyes
again.
        It must have been like this
the first time. It must have been
like this when the Preacher, standing
in the shallow waters, put his giant's
hand across your nose & mouth, and
lowered you into some rural southern
river. You looked up at him, through
the dark water, even though he said to "shut
your eyes" as he pushed you under.
When you were lifted up again, your
nipples were full and hard from
the cold water and the rush of blood
to the vital sacred parts, which washed
your sins away; and the rigor of mortality
transformed you into what you are today.
        Your eyes are clear again.
The white shift you wear, for purity's sake,
is pushed up, just as my black shirt, belt &
pants are loose and twisted aside, so that
simple coitus is easy. It seems we have lain
this way for hours, maybe we have been
always joined this way as lovers.
You move, slightly, to show you are
ready again. Alert to your signal, my
body grows hard again inside you and
my righteous hand moves up to your face.
        My left hand, beneath your head, wraps
itself in your long auburn hair and I brace
myself for the coming struggle. Your right arm
is pinioned helpless beneath my body and your left
is not strong enough to save you from what
is about to happen (and we both know
this already, from severe practice).
The scratches on my face prove this:
Death can be relentless in his love.
        Your eyes have now gone hard & lost
the look of purity, and instead the gaze
of human lust has taken hold of your soul.
You must be punished this way,
again and again.
        The missionary position seems
suited to this, for I am on a sacred mission
where my hard thrusts send you again and again
below the water's surface, like a witch
tied on a dunking pole. I sometimes feel
like a murderer pushing a corpse below
the water with a stick, as the dying
flesh gives way, again and again, to each
thrust of the stick.
        My muscles, every sinew, goes hard
and taut, braced for this task. And your body
fights back against this cruel fate, the
ignorant lower reptilian brain struggles
for some tiny breath of life. The moments pass
and soon your eyes grow dim again, your voice
muffled from the struggle with my blunt hand.
Your body, wet with a cold sweat, goes
slack against my starched cotton shirt.
You feel dead against me, and the weakness
fills my eyes with tears for what is lost.
I remove my hand. Soon I feel the faint intake
of breath and the barely muffled sob.
        As your eyes open again, I feel this
rush of joy, knowing that we will stay this
way forever. Yet, I do not leave you here
alone for more than a few days at a time
because I do not want you, desperate for absolution,
to try something like this without me.
        Accidents happen. And sometimes
      &nbsp without possibility of redemption.

Immense gains on frankfurt!

Recently I was invited to a reading of three
poets on three consecutive nights. Alice Fulton,
who has won numerous awards for her poetry
was the reader on the third night. After a
glowingly colorful introduction, Fulton launched into
her reading. I wish I could get that hour back.
As best I can tell, Fulton is a dictionary poet.
That means she takes the dictionary and looks
up words and then free associates to get her
verse (actually, she must use a philosophical
dictionary). I tried to write an actually parody
of her poetry, but the stuff is so empty that it
was hard to do that. So instead I’m creating
a “found poem” made up of text from emails.
This seems appropriate—text created by one
computer to fool another computer into thinking
that this is a real message. But it is, of course,
not a real message, but a simulation.
---------------------------------------------

Immense gains on frankfurt!


        “the new moon is just a luminous zilch.”
        Alice Fulton’s “Snow Kiln”


“If you will get banged
by your pennis with mistress?”

And they shall which he cometh with the ram for.
Then Afterward he would abound more of these chief, of the Lord that Died. Then came up to those who sought the words of God, It is unclean on all that ye therefore have dominion, The cave and aloes, and I thou and he hath given frozen: Higher. And sinful flesh that wicked children of Madon, and no peace and thou And the Lord grant you and wept sore broken brought unto thee neither Shall be not thou. And put their tents but O thou here we may write blessed is accomplished

No surprise that the signs of social fracture and growing dissatisfaction are plain to see. One in nine children is living with just one parent, relatives or a distant neighbour. Yet the sharp rift between left and right in France remains deep in the French psyche. Each day a child under the age of seven is abandoned in Moldova.
The result has been 25 years of meaningless hypocrisy. So at the moment there are 12 candidates, all of whom have won the written backing of 500 elected politicians in order to stand.
She has a small scrap of land where she grows vegetables to feed herself. Couple this with an economy that has been misfiring and it is easy to see why France is in such a deep hole, desperately looking for solutions. I often hear many negative comments about France and Europe. Who appeals most to ethnic minority voters? He was featured chatting, arguing at a factory gate with a couple of people and it worked as an engaging piece of TV.

I was channel-hopping when I came across a series of short, and quite snappy, party political broadcasts following one after the other. Mr Le Pen has rather simpler ideas on the far right - get rid of immigrants, and you get rid of the problem.

Laurie gave her a glance of filial respect and love as he replied. “you hate the thought of it?" said jack, as he was giving jill her early walk "oh, yes, pitch about like nutshells and when he couldn't have one sister he took the other, and was happy." nice to hide the scar on his forehead, eyes closed in spite of herself and she forgot where she was and fell among with satisfaction at the prospect before them.

¡¡i played at hot cockles, last petite redhaired girl banged two huge black cocks << tiny teen babe gets pounded !

meet Bob Dole....

The Love Song of Bob Dole
& "The Greatest Generation"

        "I was shy and tender...."
        Allen Ginsberg's "You Know What I'm Saying?"


ashes to ashes, dicks to dust
it takes a pill to stoke our lust
& even if Libby gets skin like leather
all us old farts stick together

we fought the war again' the Nazi
and even beat the goddam Japanee
so we could wear coats made of pleather
that's why us old farts stick together

bald old heads & baggy old skin
cancerous prostate & saggy chin
wearing Ben-Gay in hot sticky weather
makes us old farts stick together

& when we go to His throne on Judgement Day
we'll all be singin' "i did it my waayyy...."

The Earl of Sandwich is a Glistening God

The Earl of Sandwich is a Glistening God

        "We're in too deep...."
        Jorie Graham's "Prayer"


I met two salmon once
in a motel room near Troy, Nebraska--
glimmering and slippery they were,
as tasty as the finest eels, brown and golden
in a frying pan.

The first lay upside down & backwards, while the other
stood beside the bed--patiently waiting--quick & glittering
from the wetness of my mind, where it had dipped into
and found my secret (as I knelt on the bed in prayer):
I have this great emptiness, deep within me,
        which needs to be filled.
Nothing else matters.

They were not endangered, not by me at least;
I had never killed anything that way
(except perhaps that time I morally
wounded a dwarf mongoose in Rhode Island,
and I gagged once on an albino python in Montreal)
I hold within so many things--
one size fits all, but I am not unquenchable.

Plunging upwards, the upturned salmon swam against the stream
he found the running bitter waters
he found the deepest part, too sweet,
he found the quickening tissues of life's first ocean
and mouthed with his ovule lips the words, words, words
first spoken by The Serpent in The Garden
and felt the knot--a bit off from what he thought--
but truly there.

I felt his thirst unloosened by the in-betweeness
that I shared--I named the two salmon: Far Better
and Four Worse.

Deeper, deeper, into less and less--their minds unfastened
with a quickening gait.
The smooth surfaces of things split, rejoined, and split again
the timeless motions, the quickening, the race, ...
Too deep? he said,
        like the bluebird's beak
lowering the early worm into the open gaping mouth--
like the yawning chick, my blindness was all peripheral
a matter of perspective, the immanent domain of trousers
snaking their way edgewise into the gullet of the opening maw,
like soiled clothes touching the edge of an overstuffed hamper.

Bluish and empurpled veins stand out on the salmon, too
tight skin, as my kisses land on every inch of the seeable
translucent self. Meanwhile, the upturned salmon, bare and bony,
feeds on small puddles of snowmelt, lapping up the miles.
With his endless inwardness, he disperses his sea-like
wetness in the uncoalescing openings.

I turn round to face the upturned salmon
resting my haunches on his tiny pelvis bone
and place the emptiness of my self-same stillness on his swelling brine-filled
forward motion, the tiny upliftings, the rise and falling of things
unseen, undreamt of, like the long red rays of the sun going (up &) down.

The other salmon moves closer, so that soon
in his approach he is not so much near me as in me
Glad to be in? No? So unprotected
from your rubbery glance, so plastic in your
stretched smile. He was
pointing out his full bodylength, like a gull's neck
Love big enough to hide in a breadbox--
all that is true, I carry inside me,
and out and in, this bodywidth of frailty.
My eyes fix on the singular redness of the thing
the unnatural thickening, just there, anticipating
the eruption of the present, the simultaneous emptying,
the undulations, the eager logic, the perplexed engines of desire....

The radio by the bed announced:
"... they were readied by forces she did not recognize ..."

at that last moment we moved, by prearranged signals
so that the one stood at my feet, above the glistening sheets
where my welcoming toes stand out, and the other moves
to my face where my bluest eye begs for his oblation.

        the ending of things
all too certain--a shattering of selves into the rubble
and debris, like ancient Troy a shattering of statues into
unseemly piles of arms, and heads, and legs--the faces
worn away and wedged in between.
We lay there, as Paris, Menelaus & Helen lay--
bodies jumbled up as the shattered stone
our juices spilled for kings.

Even the ear, too, is finally satiated
and the window swallows these words:
"Wait! Did I say salmon? ... I meant salesmen."

The Strangest MRDP I Ever Did See

The Strangest MRDP I Ever Did See

        "They can't separate probably...."
        Robert Hass' "Dragonflies Mating"

One day walking in a tangled wood
Past the cool stream
Past the weeping stand of willows
Under the warm sun, beaming down,
I saw them.

They lay there, almost helpless,
Writhing in the agony of the damned,
        Angels,
Two of them, joined at the hip,
The strangest MRDP I ever did see on earth.

And what was really strange,
About angels, I mean,
Was they have no breasts,
Not even the merest vestigial Vestal vessels for the
Milk of human kindness....
Looking at them is hard on the eyes 'cause bisexually
        They look, one way, male
        And, another way, female
And even the (I think) female has breasts no bigger
Than a double AA cup, like a Pre-teenager
And the (I think) male looked like a boy
With a caved-in sunken chest and sticky-outee nipples
Like an bitch that just gave birth last week.

Their skin was slickly white, like a marbleized plaster bust
And the rock-like flesh did not give at all
To the pressure of the rocks and leaves and sticks
That were under them, pushing up, as they thrashed around.
But this same marble skin was covered with honey,
At least it looked like honey, or perhaps it was
The yellowed bee-extruded licorice-looking Ambrosial
        Sweat of Angels
Who, flying in the night, connect (by accident)
Crashing together like blind seagulls (at least
That's the story they'll tell later).
But here they were, stuck together like two dogs
Caught and helpless in their passion, needing a bucket of water
Thrown on them.

And as they rolled across the grass, the leaves
Stuck to their waxy, honeyed limbs, like rose petals
Clinging to the bees that had assaulted them (sexually).

Taking pity on their sufferings, I found a long limb
Broken in a storm from an old elm (useless for a fireplace)
And, raising it over my head, brought it down across their
Head&shoulders repeatedly, again and again, until
In more than mortal pain&anguish, they pulled apart
And then, without a by-your-leave, or thanks (to me) of any kind
They sprouted enormous wings and flapping
Lifted themselves into the empty sky.

Nothing else of note happened that day
Except my hands--even to this day--have the smell
Of burnt cat-piss, just like an elm branch thrown in the fire.

You don't believe me? Here, smell my finger.


-----------------------------------------------
Eric Dutton suggests that "MRDP" stands for Mystical Realization of
Divine Providence, and another reader suggests Magical Realist Double Penetration, but the reader can choose whatever phrase seems most appropriate.


This poem was first published in Arkansas Literary Forum
http://fac.hsu.edu/beggsm/ALF/2003/lee2.htm

Death Returns from Holiday

This poem was influenced, not so much by Meet Joe Black as
by the earlier film Death Takes a Holiday (1934). In this
version of the story, Death tires of his job and decides
to woo the daughter of a millionaire (played by Frederic March).
While he is "on holiday" people stop dying. The terminally ill,
those horribly maimed by accidents, all continue to suffer
because they are unable to die.
--------------------------------



Death Returns from Holiday

        "... Nothing ever felt this good."
Marie Howe's "Death, the Last Visit"
       

I find you and you wrap your fleshy thighs
        Around my torso,
Spinning I send you around the emptiness of your room.

I'm sorry I was late, but you understand--
        Your open mouth beckons for it
The saltiest of any salty cock you've ever had.

Now that I have you, I won't ever leave,
        Even after that bitchy smell
Fills the air with that aroma which is only you.

I take you the way you always hated it
        Doggie-style, like Cerberus--three-headed,
Triphallic; and I'm lucky you're a three input kind of gal.

My tongue pries open your mouth, your tongue swells
        With lust at my insistence
Feeding my advance with your sweetest breath.

You thought no man could ever reach this deep inside--
        No man can touch your heart the way I do
Perhaps dislodge a kidney, pierce a lung or two.

A sour nipple explodes at the nearness of my touch
        Your arm twitches with residual delight
Stray neurons firing like that one last, best orgasm of the night.

There's something about that glisten in your eye that says,
        "God, forgive me." But you know I always do,
Then, thick lips pressed to your ovule mouth, I say:

        "I love you....
I'm sorry I was late. Did I make it up to you?"
        I hope so, because forever after,
A corpse, three days dead, is all that's left of you.

The Errors of Poetry

I wrote this poem after reading T.R. Hummer's "Where you go when she sleeps"

I found his poem to be deeply offensive, and I wrote this in the white heat of anger...
_____________________
The Errors of Poetry

    "... whatever vacuum you were in before"
    T.R. Hummer's "Where you go when she sleeps"


What does it mean when you walk into the living room
    and see a guy sitting on your couch,
        his hand cradling a woman's head against his lap?

What is it with this guy?
What is it about her face in his crotch,
    that makes him think about oats being sucked out of a silo?
Why is it that all things golden,
    even "the deep rush of the grain"
        remind him of death,
    or his last, best orgasm while drunk on pure-grain alcohol
        or high on Panama Gold?

Is it her golden hair, tinted black at the roots?
Is it the tattoo of their golden retriever
    inked with brown henna on her shoulder blade?
Is it the golden ring, piercing her lower lip, which brings
    to mind that time she took his yellow Beemer
        and crashed it into the lake
(and how--inspired by his name--she made it up to him later)?
Or is it the "vacuum you were in before" that great emptiness
    deep within her golden skin--her mind, like Yorick's,
        which begs over and over to be filled.

How much depends on rendering into verse
    the corpse of some forgotten farmer's son
        lost in a silo full of oats?

And why does this poem remind me of Eric Clapton,
    or anyone who's ever written a poem about a guardian angel?

        I don't know--you tell me.