An American Papyrus: 25 Poems | Page 9

tides you in?the rear?You arise from the raft of the mattress.?Then you cover up your nakedness,?And move to the light of the living room.
And then I actually see you, Don, in the hour that you?had told?Me to step back in. You are bending over the?end-table stained?In the blood of wine. Sunlight, stripped silver from?the grey?Clouds, pours through the window to the table.?To your right a nine of swords card of a man pierced?in the?Back gleams as it walls the card of your future?lovers.,?And the redness of Doctrines and Covenants to the far?left of?That table also looks pure in the light.?You do not see me. Your mind is racked in screwing?the pack?For an answer. You turn another Tarot Card?In the order your destiny is to be read.
Your sad eyes look up?And your languid voice says that you are late?For your meeting with the local Bishop...?A meeting to straighten up your fucking life.?I laugh! In bitterness that shakes my intestines, I?laugh!?Another hillbilly man?Has lifted his head above the rest--a foot up from the?jug--?And has blown his breath into the air?Which 'naps another young and fragmented one?To the call of being holy.?But before you arise?You turn the gleaming card of number four--?Your eyes in a more motionless trance than before.

New England Washing?(Mental Account, Some day of Gorbechev, 1987)
Another hour.?There is no circulation?Beneath the steering wheel for my feet.?Outside myself?There is the last of the sun at dusk?But like the conquering Hsuing-Nu?Pushing themselves beyond a?Great Wall and through an eternal?Gathering, it is hardly felt.?There is nothing great to trouble me?And nothing substantial descends on my senses,?Giving me thoughts other than the fact I'm thinking?nothing:?Only?A flock of birds in the corner of my left eye?Blend down with the grey skies?As if the fence barricading?The farm land does not pertain to them;?Thoughts of the center line?And not going over it.?Days of Gorbechev, the radio speaks of,?But not his nights--where, one time?He may have smashed?A big, red cigarettte in an ashtray?With an action stiff and slow;?And as he stood up the mattress of his bed may have?Raised to touch his rear, again,?Like a quick and soothing give-me-five handshake;?And opening a window of the embassy?To escape the stuffy dryness?Of electric heat to his suite,?He may have let the cool American air?Attack him with the smells and sights?Of its diplomatic car exhausts,?Grey and orange from street lamps?And store lights...and how?The nation breathed for once as it moved.
The third: road; cows, like islanders;?Multi-tinted bladed fields broken by acres?Of forests and pastures; a black-sun scene with?Car lights; a vision blurred and pebbled?Through the windshield--?A truck passes my pinto;?Muddy water slapping its face;?Its stick eyes smoothing it?To a duller complexion.?It isn't yet Christmas?And I am going home.?My parents one day drooped?In front of all, and were old--?We should be having much to say...?I, thinking like them, with?The mind of the world,?And us smiling unhappily?And speaking none of that:?But a lot will be said.?I am a bum.?One of their hearts shall give in?And their marriage will be a farce...?Even in car accidents the married?Die separately. And then the widowed?Mother, smoking the cigars of her husband,?And coughing them as the husband had done?But in the apartment of the son, might?Visit away her life: I would?Bring her there, thanking God for a reason?Not to try hiding all of me in some pussy?As in daylight the main part?Goes into underwear.
This is their town?Far from trays with saucers?And plates and spoons and forks?(Sometimes hardened in scalloped potatoes?Or bent) and knives and glasses?(Glasses sometime with folded bread inside)...?But forever coming down the belt for the?Dumping and washing...the trays that disappear?In a square hole and come out clean?Will continue regardless if I am there.?Men fuck virgins; a child-worker?Is born and all is holy.?There is nothing great to trouble me:?The rains that drop and drift next?To streets in gutters, take away?Smashed Pepsi cups and beer cans?Without intent, bound God knows where,?But out of sight.

The San Franciscan's Night Meditations
When I am at a dead-lock?In your rear and the?language of my body?Will not come from?The third element of the soul,?What am I to say?--?'ALL BUT ONE DEAD:?Mexican immigrants celebrating the?Stowing away on a 120 degree boxcar?With urine in their stomachs,?Acknowledging capitalistic thirsts...?Sigue sobre pagina"..?Double hubble?The peso is in trouble?And to Mars?America plans?Jumping over the moon,?And all this has disturbed me!"
The night is full of impulses?To live and to run and seep heavily?Into its dark robes of?Silence and morbid rightness;?And as I, again, try to thrust on dryly--?A log without a river traveling it?To the product of lumber--?and hope to create love in?The smackings of night,?Like anyone else, I know that soon?I am to appologize for lack?Of an ejaculation,?And will promise to have a counselor?Tame me to the exclusion of?All but work and lust.
Sounds of people?Kicking around the?Night of early morning?Beneath my lover's window;?And I withdraw under the sheet,?lying flat with the dead