Collecte Works (21 page)

Sorrow moves in wide waves,

    it passes, lets us be.

It uses us, we use it,

    it's blind while we see.

Consciousness is illimitable,

    too good to forsake

tho what we feel be misery

    and we know will break.

Jesse James and his brother Frank

    raided, robbed and rode away.

Said Frank to the rising Teddy R:

    You're my type, you're okay.

Once on his way to a Shakespeare play

    Frank was almost caught.

The gunnin Jameses and the writn Jameses—

    two were taught and all were sought.

No killers were Frank and Jesse James,

    they was drove to it. Their folks was proud.

Let no one imagine they were bad as kids—

    brought up gentle in a bushwhack crowd.

…

May you have lumps in your mashed potatoes

    Henry and Wm. cried

to those who stood up to them in argument

     and their words haven't died.

Don't melt too much into the universe

    but be as solid and dense and fixed

as you can. This what Henry and Wm.

    said in the evening after 6:00.

Old Mother turns blue and from us,

    “Don't let my head drop to the earth.

I'm blind and deaf.” Death from the heart,

    a thimble in her purse.

“It's a long day since last night.

    Give me space. I need

floors. Wash the floors, Lorine!—

    wash clothes! Weed!”

I hear the weather

         through the house

or is it breathing

                 mother

Dead

she now lay deaf to death

She could have grown a good rutabaga

in the burial ground

            and how she'd have loved these woods

One of her pallbearers said I

            like a dumfool followed a deer

wanted to see her jump a fence—

            never'd seen a deer jump a fence

pretty thing

           the way she runs

Can knowledge be conveyed that isn't felt?

But if transport's the problem—

they tell me get a job and earn yourself

an automobile—I'd rather collect my parts

as I go: chair, desk, house

and crankshaft Shakespeare.

Generator boy, Paul, love is carried

if it's held.

Ten o'clock

and Paul's not in bed!

He's reading Twelfth Night

all Viola said.

Drink to three, the family

around the bathroom tap.

Little Paul—Corelli,

what's that?—belly!

Wash and say good night

to variants and quarto texts,

emendations, close relations.

Let me hear good night.

Adirondack Summer

If he's not peewee wafted

          tiny glissando

          in deep shade

or a newspaper

he'll attack exercises ever calculated

to float the ear in beauty.

The slip of a girl-announcer:

Now we hear

Baxtacota in D Minor

played by a boy who's terrific.

This saxy Age.

Bach, you see, is in Dakota

but don't belittle her,

she'll take you where you want to go ta.

Now go to the party,

Master Paul Kung.

Wear your mother's ancient

imitation silk black dress,

whisk brush for beard,

your bathrobe's braid-tie

hung safety-pinned from Eton cap

turned front to back,

shoe string side burns

to hold the beard.

What you don't know,

that even yet

players come dressed with shields

and spears.

Dear Paul:

the sheets of your father's book of poetry

are bound for England.

At last, after the hardships

he can say “take back to your ship

a gift from me,

something precious, a real good thing…

such as a friend gives to a friend.”

You ask what kind of boats in
my
country