like a man in love
missing fingers
I will raise my gloves
a man who beat the schadenfreude out of the storm before the storm beat me
my friends like a hook
like a verse
my friends like a chorus stay with me
if I say it was like beating the dust from a rug with a rolling pin will you hound me
a voice like first you must pass
a voice like Charlie sang it
first you must pass a woman
like Charlie sang it must pass
a woman her eyes like the eyes
must have sang it a woman
her eyes like the eyes of a dog
must pass Charlie sang it a voice
like the eyes of a dog when it cries
must have sang it a voice
when it cries to be let out of doors
was it the chorus a voice like
first you must pass a woman
Charlie was it the verse
her eyes like the eyes of a dog
when it cries Charlie a voice
when it cries to be let out of doors
was it mine you must pass
a woman her eyes like the eyes of a dog when it cries to be let out of doors
And Camus has been dead
who wrote
this very heart of mine which will forever remain indefinable to me
two years dead
wrote Ted Berrigan in the winter of nineteen sixty-two to his wife
Already my friends I can taste
the flour on her fingers already
I feel the sun will not debut
You make my blunders Ted you say love so often the word is a slipknot you thrash
inside it the knot clenches
that I loved you before my life
that I loved you in Pat and Anne and in Dick
And Alex back home in the city his hands at his eyelids like two broken dials should I
take them apart
he wonders and start
cutting wires
or I am the trees in Brueghel
do you know the trees
everything I have to say about working my way to your heart I say with my branches
or I am the crow in Brueghel
do you know the crow
it is good the lord will die soon I say to my friends and they fly from the breaking wheel
or I am the bride in Brueghel
have you seen the bride
put on your poor shoes and rip off the door have you seen my paper crown it is beautiful
or I am the hounds in Brueghel
do you know the hounds
here is the single fox I have killed will you wear it around your shoulders are you ashamed
or I am the beggar in Brueghel
do you know the beggar
gladly I will wash my face in the dirt to inscribe my name in this stone so long as you rule it
or I am the cow in Brueghel
do you know the cow
my eyes are black and isinglass I trample in this sentence one hoof further into madness
or I am the child in Brueghel
do you know the child
this bag over my head I reach to touch among the screaming another who will wear this bag
like a man in love
how will I tell you tonight
tonight the years below me the fire turned the city a bed of coals we began our ascent
and a man on his one good hand
did not wish the fire fiction
my friends like a verse like the flour already I can taste it on her fingers stay with me
like a man in love
how will I tell her today
today my life before me the fire turned your city a bed of coals I begin my descent
and a man on his one good hand
wishes the fire stay with me
past the ambushed one the fortunate one the only words she knew I will
past the slated one is she bathing her boys in the false dawn is she thirsty
past the gaptooth one stuck forever in a theater in a blackout in winter
past the disappeared the stalked one wringing spoiled wine from a lung
past the shatterproof one in her breast the stakes of how many settlers
past the looted one the ransacked one her mouth like a sucked-out rind
past the singed one reading fiction so long as it ended with ships sunk
past the fatherless one she burned off her clothes the body was soldered
past the weathered one like a hand into camphor she passed through life
past the firebrand the cussed one knocking out teeth while she bucked
past the one bred of colts her emptiest face evicted a bird from the aerie
past the childless one she said in the suite my womb it is ash it smolders
past the breeched one her allegiance to nothing unless you count nothing
past the perdition the bitten one the one who fed hounds from her hand
past the one in refusal of death I will die a face burned into your tongue
past the mother in sackcloth the one unbidden her only lesson a blunder
singing first you must pass
like a man in love
I gut the night I am answerless I flail in my redness toward you like a nerve
son of no man who cancels himself to hazard himself through me
son of no woman who strikes herself from a sentence no man can write
I write on god’s face while he sleeps I write canceled I box his ears and I wake him
lord of nothing my tie see is houndstooth the knot see is windsor I gut the night toward
my love like a run in her stockings
daughter of no man worth only his silence to what he can’t speak
daughter of no woman who boxed up her bones and forgot them like toothpicks
like a man in love
do not forget me if I stand at your door and occur and end and occur
do not forget me I’m the storm in Brueghel do you know the storm I break toward you
my friends will you howl if the sun does not debut
my friends will you hound me like a hook in my mouth stay with me
do not forget me say he ate one crumb of this woman’s name and was king
do not forget me say and then my friend he outlawed kings
like a man in love
fugitive when you call me fugitive
say so to say flight
say so to say we have fled our gasoline towns
say so to say fugitive our flight presses as far as you can throw a stone
and fugitive the earth is everywhere stones
like a man in love
is everywhere a heart indefinable to me and a fire that isn’t fiction
is everywhere my friends their hands dismantling themselves like matryoshkas
is everywhere Charlie sang it convincing myself your face exists where it isn’t
is everywhere do not say love do not pull the word like a hair from your tongue
like a man in love
they will hound you fugitive they will say where is your band of white silver
fugitive where is his name you took like a punch
to which like a woman in love will you say I am wearing it see my ring is a ring of flour
already he can taste it on my finger
like a man in love
in the myth I break like your voice when you sing like a hook stay with me
in my life I died a man no man could answer I gutted the night
like a man in love
I gutted the night I sewed your name through it to stay its insides from falling