576
first sun
the also up
it's through ether spun
and had to be wing-lifted
every morning
not twice the same
as if a star came calling
there was a very moted dance
through beams
where all the worlds
are dust
it shone the green leaf
till the season turned
and we were with it rising
who could guess one world's mortality from this?
they have tried not to worship
but that wouldn't work
soon we all should pray for rain
isn't this fellow cheering us on?
I write into your dark
you half-a-day-behind
no nightbulb
this is the lamp for interrogation
it is a tinsel whimsy
its own vitamin as well
we held it till a blindness was
this love can never be divided
(but by cloud, which goes)
and all of us inspire
here we all are in the spot
wasn't there a treetop trill?
we were new worded with it
like a moon grown gold
the first time
can there be new to say?
yes! every day there is
Comrade Kris Hemensley at the Collected Works bookstore in Melbourne had the American poet Jerome Rothenberg there to read recently. Whose poetry, JR's, I've been off reading on a cloud lately. For some reason, your poem reminded me of this poem, which I discussed with my class this afternoon.
ReplyDeleteA DEEP ROMANTIC CHASM
for Michael McClure
A deep romantic chasm
beckons him it leaves no time
to hide from light
in spite of circumstances,
& the way the street
flows like a stream
from no source,
nowhere. This season
with its birds
newly arrived,
the first one on a fence,
mortal as you,
a harbinger of days to come.
Another word,
a false return,
the spoken still unspoken
carries us off.
The cavern of the universe
widens each morning.
My head fills up with dew,
the father writes,
having no home but where
his shadow leads him.
In greasy shirtsleeves, heavy
lids, blotched faces,
the men pursue
a trail of tears,
unbuttoned captive
to a dream,
a starless galaxy,
the deeper sky
a field of images
measureless & mindless,
absent their god.