Poem in the Third Style | QLRS Vol. 4 No. 2 Jan 2005

I've made a decision to smoke and drink

In my own home, the man says.

(He blows on his fingers.)

The odor of wet wool drifts into the room.

To the right of his armchair

Crouches Bowser. A tubercular Turk

Is itching for a game of pétanque.

The man in the armchair declines.

(Makes the motion of someone pitching la boule.)

Several people drop to the floor

In obeisance to an unseen power.

Do you remember the Hapsburg chin

You spotted last year? The eye

Was epileptic green. That one over there

Went deaf in Afghanistan.

My responsibilities are concluded.

(He makes the hitchhiker sign.)

I'm just an ancillary figure.

You remember the one who appended doo-dah, doo-dah

To remarks he detested? (Asked abruptly,

As if the man had just entered his own conversation.)

I began with abstractions. When I turned

My back, a meadow of words broke into flower.

II.

They say you've returned from... (He draws

A circle in the air.)... We often travel in

Circles. (Said in a low voice.) Night comes early.

Here too. What I want (grimace)... There's...

(He runs his index finger horizontally across his neck

In the off-with-the-head sign.) If that's...

(Pulls in his index, turns out his thumb, and shakes

His hand downward: no mercy.) When the pertinent wheels

(Coughs)... Who can (drawn out slowly)... Who

Can (peremptorily)... Once, I too (dry laugh –

Slaps the air twice)....

III.

Let's say you're standing

On the corner and somebody

Lowers a newspaper

And starts speaking a language

You don't understand,

Then covers his face. No problem.

But what if a passer-by

Points to that person and says,

"He's authorized."

A question arises:

"Are you?"

Pretty soon a lot

Of people might be speaking

That kind of talk and you'll

Be handing on by your

Fingertips. You demur,

"It's nonsense. I'll

Just say something that doesn't

Mean anything." Won't work.

Soon you realize

You're making sense. You can't

Speak nonsense. No matter

How hard you try, you're lucid.

In fact, you're eloquent.

You do justice

To urgent theories

That give life coherence.

You begin to issue statements.

Your latest releases tend

To unify vast audiences.

The scene shifts. You are alone.

The sun goes down cold red.

IV.

It is a disdain for process. Natural

Aristocracy does not remember

The means of production. Linguistic appearance

(Lies, gossip, rumor) does not exist.

To remember is degrading. Later,

By a paradoxical flip, process

Will be revered – as if by simply explaining

The arduous journey to a bad decision,

One is excused. Even lucubration

Has no place. The origin of the question

Is the consideration of antecedents and consequents,

Untidy matters contradictive of divinity.

To have an uncle would be derivative.

The words proceed steadily.

They are not screaming or being maladroit.

To speak interminably without reservation

Is a succinct gesture. One wonders

If a new form of nonsense is being created.

Perhaps pure sound. Across the page

It runs. Who will transcribe it?

VI.

As we learn to discern, we learn to be deceived.

For many years one trains strenuously. Refines. Focuses.

Nuance narrows. We presuppose a number of things.

A connoisseur passes. Phone calls bounce back.

We want to be present at the birth of something exquisite.

Plenitude beckons. Key 305 hands from peg 316a.

Someone with thudding feet is following us.

The narrative stops for a scuffle. Ned from Argentina

Is in town. Four on a side we shoot 'em up.

As we track the animal, we hear the bell

Attached to our belts. The mouth is bleeding. Many sit

At table. The food has been prepared in magic ovens. April.

Forty miles from nowhere. The azaleas looking vaguely

Familiar. An elderly man kicking a rock.