Housewife
Seraphic and relaxed, you take
Your novel with uncertain thumbs,
As one who lingers over cake
And dreads the thought of final crumbs.
Your novel with uncertain thumbs,
As one who lingers over cake
And dreads the thought of final crumbs.
Frown at my precious sorcery
And label me an envious elf.
If human beings could agree
Their boredom might revenge itself.
And label me an envious elf.
If human beings could agree
Their boredom might revenge itself.
O youthful housewife, weighing grains
Of joy upon your empty smile,
The total of my bolder gains
Is but a more impressive guile.
Of joy upon your empty smile,
The total of my bolder gains
Is but a more impressive guile.
Your serious child wins the alert
And limpid art of playing tag,
While your emotions rest inert
Like dried fruit in a paper bag.
And limpid art of playing tag,
While your emotions rest inert
Like dried fruit in a paper bag.
VI.
Woman
They worship musical sound
Protecting the breast of emotion.
Their feelings pose as fortune-tellers
And angle for coins from credulous thoughts.
Shall we abandon this luxury
Of mild mist and wild raptures?
Your face refrains from saying yes
But your closed eyes roundly
Reward the luminous sentence.
Greece and Asia have exchanged
Problems upon your face,
And the fine poise of your head
Tries to catch their conversation.
Few people care to use
Thought as a musical instrument
That brings its singing restraint to grief and joy,
But we, with straight arms, will descend
Daringly upon this situation.
The full-blown confusion of life
Will detest our intrusion.
Protecting the breast of emotion.
Their feelings pose as fortune-tellers
And angle for coins from credulous thoughts.
Shall we abandon this luxury
Of mild mist and wild raptures?
Your face refrains from saying yes
But your closed eyes roundly
Reward the luminous sentence.
Greece and Asia have exchanged
Problems upon your face,
And the fine poise of your head
Tries to catch their conversation.
Few people care to use
Thought as a musical instrument
That brings its singing restraint to grief and joy,
But we, with straight arms, will descend
Daringly upon this situation.
The full-blown confusion of life
Will detest our intrusion.
VII.
Old Actor
Any minor poet can claim
That his subject resembles music.
(“Her steps were notes of music.”
“His presence was like a song.”)
You are a long-neglected
Instrument from which the player,
With over-confident lips, blows only
A jet of dust that falls upon
The damp chagrin of his face.
Moist from the futile effort
He asks his listeners to admire
Imaginary notes.
They clap their hands, and he must retire
To the slow digesting of his lie.
Old actor, you have finished reciting Hamlet;
Your pennies are gathered; and you depart.
That his subject resembles music.
(“Her steps were notes of music.”
“His presence was like a song.”)
You are a long-neglected
Instrument from which the player,
With over-confident lips, blows only
A jet of dust that falls upon
The damp chagrin of his face.
Moist from the futile effort
He asks his listeners to admire
Imaginary notes.
They clap their hands, and he must retire
To the slow digesting of his lie.
Old actor, you have finished reciting Hamlet;
Your pennies are gathered; and you depart.
NEGRO CRIMINAL
From the pensive treachery of my cell
I can hear your mournful yell.
Centuries of pain are pressed
Into one unconscious jest
As your scream disrobes your soul.
The silence of your iron hole
Is hot and stolid, like a guest
Weary of seeing men undressed.
Like the silence, I listen
Because I dread the glisten
Of a hidden humour that strains
Under the stumble of all pains.
Brown and wildly clownish shape
Thrown into a cell for rape,
You contain the tortured laugh
Of a pilgrim-imbecile whose staff
Taps against a massive comedy.
Melodrama burlesques itself with free
And stony voice, and wears a row of masks
To lure the joviality of tasks.
Melodrama, you, and I,
We are merely tongues that try
To ogle a protesting dream
Into whisper, laugh, and scream.
I can hear your mournful yell.
Centuries of pain are pressed
Into one unconscious jest
As your scream disrobes your soul.
The silence of your iron hole
Is hot and stolid, like a guest
Weary of seeing men undressed.
Like the silence, I listen
Because I dread the glisten
Of a hidden humour that strains
Under the stumble of all pains.
Brown and wildly clownish shape
Thrown into a cell for rape,
You contain the tortured laugh
Of a pilgrim-imbecile whose staff
Taps against a massive comedy.
Melodrama burlesques itself with free
And stony voice, and wears a row of masks
To lure the joviality of tasks.
Melodrama, you, and I,
We are merely tongues that try
To ogle a protesting dream
Into whisper, laugh, and scream.
SHORT STORY IN SONNET FORM
Loud chatter in a thousand minor lines
Was your religion, and your art was pain
Disguised by phrases of verbose disdain.
You married an old man who gave you wines
Lukewarm and pink, until your tipsy youth,
Grown weary of evading sensual lies,
Ran to idiot-Pierrot whose cries
Created that delusion known as truth.
The ache of your sincerity betrayed
His awkward falseness, and he turned away,
Grinning until your bullet found his head.
Then people claimed that you had merely paid
Insanely for a tritely sordid play.
Your lyric could not answer—it was dead.
Was your religion, and your art was pain
Disguised by phrases of verbose disdain.
You married an old man who gave you wines
Lukewarm and pink, until your tipsy youth,
Grown weary of evading sensual lies,
Ran to idiot-Pierrot whose cries
Created that delusion known as truth.
The ache of your sincerity betrayed
His awkward falseness, and he turned away,
Grinning until your bullet found his head.
Then people claimed that you had merely paid
Insanely for a tritely sordid play.
Your lyric could not answer—it was dead.
FEMININE TALK
First Woman
Do you share the present dread
Of being sentimental?
The world has flung its boutonnière
Into the mud, and steps upon it
With elaborate gestures!
Of being sentimental?
The world has flung its boutonnière
Into the mud, and steps upon it
With elaborate gestures!
Second Woman
Sentimentality
Is the servant-girl of certain men
And the wife of others.
She scarcely ever flirts
With creative minds,
Striving also to become
Graceful and indiscreet.
Is the servant-girl of certain men
And the wife of others.
She scarcely ever flirts
With creative minds,
Striving also to become
Graceful and indiscreet.
First Woman
Sappho and Aristotle
Have wandered through the centuries,
Dressed in an occasional novelty—
A little twist of outward form.
They have always been ashamed
To be caught in a friendly talk.
Have wandered through the centuries,
Dressed in an occasional novelty—
A little twist of outward form.
They have always been ashamed
To be caught in a friendly talk.
Second Woman
When emotion and the mind
Engage in deliberate dialogue,
One hundred nightingales
And intellectuals find a common ground,
And curse the meeting of their slaves!
Engage in deliberate dialogue,
One hundred nightingales
And intellectuals find a common ground,
And curse the meeting of their slaves!
First Woman
The mind must only play
With polished relics of emotion,
And the heart must never lighten
Burdens of the mind.
With polished relics of emotion,
And the heart must never lighten
Burdens of the mind.
Second Woman
I desire to be
Irrelevant and voluble,
Leaving my terse disgust for a moment.
I have met an erudite poet
With a northern hardness
Motionless beneath his youthful robes.
He shuns the quivering fluencies
Of emotion, and shifts his dominoes
Within a room of tortured angles.
But away from this creative room
He sells himself to the whims
Of his wife, a young virago
With a calculating nose.
Beneath the flagrant pose
Of his double life
Emotion and the mind
Look disconsolately at each other.
Irrelevant and voluble,
Leaving my terse disgust for a moment.
I have met an erudite poet
With a northern hardness
Motionless beneath his youthful robes.
He shuns the quivering fluencies
Of emotion, and shifts his dominoes
Within a room of tortured angles.
But away from this creative room
He sells himself to the whims
Of his wife, a young virago
With a calculating nose.
Beneath the flagrant pose
Of his double life
Emotion and the mind
Look disconsolately at each other.
First Woman
Lyrical abandon
And mental cautiousness
Must not mingle to a magic
Glowing, yet deliberate.
And mental cautiousness
Must not mingle to a magic
Glowing, yet deliberate.
Second Woman
THE SWORD CONVERSES WITH A PHILOSOPHER
Sword
The Hindoo raises his arms
And holds them level with his shoulders
Till they become still and permanent, like horizons.
But I prefer to stumble
Into abrupt harmonies
That must ever be flung aside.
With one quick slash I cut
Lips of death upon an expressionless breast,
And a vermilion sincerity
Pardons the sophistry of flesh.
It is better to make
And leave the moments of a poem
Than to erect an ingenious pedestal
Upon which blindness solemnly squats.
And holds them level with his shoulders
Till they become still and permanent, like horizons.
But I prefer to stumble
Into abrupt harmonies
That must ever be flung aside.
With one quick slash I cut
Lips of death upon an expressionless breast,
And a vermilion sincerity
Pardons the sophistry of flesh.
It is better to make
And leave the moments of a poem
Than to erect an ingenious pedestal
Upon which blindness solemnly squats.
Philosopher
Men’s tongues are slow, and they have made you
To avenge their hidden shame at this.
You give startling girdles to virgins,
Red beards to thieves,
And writhing necklaces to children,
Because the tongues of men are slow
And revel in your quicker rhythms.
An idiot whirls you around his head
And persuades himself that he is swift.
Imagination drenches his eyes
And he spreads himself flat on your blade.
To avenge their hidden shame at this.
You give startling girdles to virgins,
Red beards to thieves,
And writhing necklaces to children,
Because the tongues of men are slow
And revel in your quicker rhythms.
An idiot whirls you around his head
And persuades himself that he is swift.
Imagination drenches his eyes
And he spreads himself flat on your blade.
Sword
All of your words are concentrated
Into the glittering censure of my blade!
Into the glittering censure of my blade!
Philosopher
Life wraps its layer of touch around one,
Like a haunting blanket
Smothering the taunting lips of a child.
Curving their fingers around your hilt
Men strive to purchase the triumph
Of an imagined escape.
I teach them plaintively to weave
Schemes of consolation
On the broad texture of their lives.
You tell them to slash the fabric,
Reaching into the black space underneath it.
You are not a symbol of cruelty.
An innocent impatience
Sharpens the comedy of your blade.
Like a haunting blanket
Smothering the taunting lips of a child.
Curving their fingers around your hilt
Men strive to purchase the triumph
Of an imagined escape.
I teach them plaintively to weave
Schemes of consolation
On the broad texture of their lives.
You tell them to slash the fabric,
Reaching into the black space underneath it.
You are not a symbol of cruelty.
An innocent impatience
Sharpens the comedy of your blade.
Sword
Men have only two choices—
To worship idols or mimic fireflies,
And I lend my strength to each choice,
Teaching them to abandon
The harlequin raptures of words.
To worship idols or mimic fireflies,
And I lend my strength to each choice,
Teaching them to abandon
The harlequin raptures of words.
Philosopher
CAPTAIN SIMMONS
An arbitrary architect
Became his mind, and planned
Cathedrals, mansions, and shops
In a room enclosed by hair.
And so a crowded town
Occupied the dwarfed miles in his head,
And along the boundary-line
That separated thought from emotion
Darkly seething slums grew up.
Owing to the lack of space
Prevailing in mental slums,
Some buildings had been forced
Into the realm of emotion.
Within these structures half-breeds lived—
Creatures whose inconsequent
Color prevented them
From being entirely logical,
And whose reeking impulses
Were deplorably snubbed by thought.
Being from the slums of mind
These hybrids loved the dirt of arguments
Inherited from centuries of men,
Stopping now and then
To order emotional brandy.
Became his mind, and planned
Cathedrals, mansions, and shops
In a room enclosed by hair.
And so a crowded town
Occupied the dwarfed miles in his head,
And along the boundary-line
That separated thought from emotion
Darkly seething slums grew up.
Owing to the lack of space
Prevailing in mental slums,
Some buildings had been forced
Into the realm of emotion.
Within these structures half-breeds lived—
Creatures whose inconsequent
Color prevented them
From being entirely logical,
And whose reeking impulses
Were deplorably snubbed by thought.
Being from the slums of mind
These hybrids loved the dirt of arguments
Inherited from centuries of men,
Stopping now and then
To order emotional brandy.
MORE ABOUT CAPTAIN SIMMONS
Captain Simmons’ legs
Were praying after much capering.
Legs can pray without kneeling
When they steal pity from city streets.
On Captain Simmons’ face
Wrinkled inhibitions were giving
Moth-eaten lace to that soft tolerance
Where memory and dying desire sleep without dreams.
Captain Simmons’ black suit
Fitted him loosely while his mind
Became him tightly, and the reason
Flickered in his smile.
For all of life he had hidden
Beneath a loose generosity
In order to escape the fact
That certain of his thoughts
Were supplied with tights and slyness,
And his smile was a lit candle held
For a moment uncertainly over this situation.
If one mentioned that Captain Simmons
Was possessed by the plight of eyes
Like pinched chicaneries of fate,
Above a face of visual penuries,
One would only hide his essential parts
Beneath the futility of explanation.
Were praying after much capering.
Legs can pray without kneeling
When they steal pity from city streets.
On Captain Simmons’ face
Wrinkled inhibitions were giving
Moth-eaten lace to that soft tolerance
Where memory and dying desire sleep without dreams.
Captain Simmons’ black suit
Fitted him loosely while his mind
Became him tightly, and the reason
Flickered in his smile.
For all of life he had hidden
Beneath a loose generosity
In order to escape the fact
That certain of his thoughts
Were supplied with tights and slyness,
And his smile was a lit candle held
For a moment uncertainly over this situation.
If one mentioned that Captain Simmons
Was possessed by the plight of eyes
Like pinched chicaneries of fate,
Above a face of visual penuries,
One would only hide his essential parts
Beneath the futility of explanation.
CAPTAIN SIMMONS’ WIFE
She moved in a calculating trot,
Relinquishing hairsbreadths of her life
With each step, and gathering
Atoms of humour and melancholy
Into one last excuse for existence.
It is true that she was playing
Housewife to her thoughts and emotions.
Her intangible household had attained
A weak and exquisite indirectness,
And she fiddled with its meager neatness;
Protected them as they stooped
Over the knitting of remorse;
Fed them platters of minced scandal
And mildly censured the relish with which they ate;
Persuaded them that they could dream best
When they were uncomfortable;
Swept out bedrooms for fear
That the talkative candour of her dislikes
Might falter in the presence of dust;
And clinked the silver on side-boards
In an effort to convince herself
That she was still robustly mercenary.
Relinquishing hairsbreadths of her life
With each step, and gathering
Atoms of humour and melancholy
Into one last excuse for existence.
It is true that she was playing
Housewife to her thoughts and emotions.
Her intangible household had attained
A weak and exquisite indirectness,
And she fiddled with its meager neatness;
Protected them as they stooped
Over the knitting of remorse;
Fed them platters of minced scandal
And mildly censured the relish with which they ate;
Persuaded them that they could dream best
When they were uncomfortable;
Swept out bedrooms for fear
That the talkative candour of her dislikes
Might falter in the presence of dust;
And clinked the silver on side-boards
In an effort to convince herself
That she was still robustly mercenary.
NORTH CLARK STREET, CHICAGO
I.
Tame and ghastly coffins
Display their shamefaced grays and reds
Against the passive vividness of morning.
From the base of these large coffins
Men and women walk,
Like briskly servile automata.
Some repentant toy-maker
Has given them a cunning pretense of life.
Display their shamefaced grays and reds
Against the passive vividness of morning.
From the base of these large coffins
Men and women walk,
Like briskly servile automata.
Some repentant toy-maker
Has given them a cunning pretense of life.
A waitress hurries to her work.
Her yellow hair and face stained red
Blend into a garish mendicant
Who steals unreal composure from the morning.
Behind her tramps a bloodless Jew.
The stench of endless denials
Has wrenched his youthful face
Into a prophecy of middle age.
He does not see the lamely leaden
Shop-girl, where despair and apathy,
Fighting, produce the motion of her limbs.
She does not see this elderly laborer
Upon whose face an artist
Her yellow hair and face stained red
Blend into a garish mendicant
Who steals unreal composure from the morning.
Behind her tramps a bloodless Jew.
The stench of endless denials
Has wrenched his youthful face
Into a prophecy of middle age.
He does not see the lamely leaden
Shop-girl, where despair and apathy,
Fighting, produce the motion of her limbs.
She does not see this elderly laborer
Upon whose face an artist
Lies smashed and gasping for breath,
And he does not regard
This thread irresolutely falling
From a tapestry of memory:
This slender woman in black.
The glittering indifference of morning
Divides their faces.
And he does not regard
This thread irresolutely falling
From a tapestry of memory:
This slender woman in black.
The glittering indifference of morning
Divides their faces.
II.
Afternoon has fallen on this street,
Like an imbecilic organ-grinder
Grinning over his discords.
Dead men and women spin
Their miracles of motion
Upon the grayness of this street.
In this old Jew’s shop
A woman bargains over calico.
With a ghostly naïveté
She reprimands the price of her shroud.
In this pawn-shop stands a man
Parting with his clarinet.
He walks away, with dangling arms,
Like a swindled Gabriel.
In a lunchroom sits a woman
Whose face is a tired sin
Seeking comfort in religion.
A young girl near her is an angel
Puzzled by streaks of mud upon her face
And asking questions of her vanity.
Outside, dead men and women
Are whipped on by the explosive magic
Of an old, resistless masquerade.
Street-cars, wagons, and motor-trucks
Rattle their parodies on life,
And over all the afternoon
Twists, like an imbecilic organ-grinder
Snickering over his discords.
Like an imbecilic organ-grinder
Grinning over his discords.
Dead men and women spin
Their miracles of motion
Upon the grayness of this street.
In this old Jew’s shop
A woman bargains over calico.
With a ghostly naïveté
She reprimands the price of her shroud.
In this pawn-shop stands a man
Parting with his clarinet.
He walks away, with dangling arms,
Like a swindled Gabriel.
In a lunchroom sits a woman
Whose face is a tired sin
Seeking comfort in religion.
A young girl near her is an angel
Puzzled by streaks of mud upon her face
And asking questions of her vanity.
Outside, dead men and women
Are whipped on by the explosive magic
Of an old, resistless masquerade.
Street-cars, wagons, and motor-trucks
Rattle their parodies on life,
And over all the afternoon
Twists, like an imbecilic organ-grinder
Snickering over his discords.
III.
Night has thrown his ecstasy
Of staring, counterfeit eyes
Over the torrent of this street.
Men with faces quicker
And more furtive than time
Stand motionless in doorways.
Women stride down this street.
Many fingers have pulled their faces
To a haggard lack of expression.
They join the motionless men
In the doorways and disappear.
And over them the tame and ghastly coffins
Display their shamefaced grays and reds
Against the tangled vividness of night.
Of staring, counterfeit eyes
Over the torrent of this street.
Men with faces quicker
And more furtive than time
Stand motionless in doorways.
Women stride down this street.
Many fingers have pulled their faces
To a haggard lack of expression.
They join the motionless men
In the doorways and disappear.
And over them the tame and ghastly coffins
Display their shamefaced grays and reds
Against the tangled vividness of night.
LANDSCAPE
The countless vagaries of maple leaves,
Elastic humbleness of flowers and weeds,
The hill, a placid stoic to all creeds,
They use an obvious language that deceives
The subtle theories of human ears.
Their tongue is motion and they scorn the rhyme
And meter made by men to soothe their fears.
Elastic humbleness of flowers and weeds,
The hill, a placid stoic to all creeds,
They use an obvious language that deceives
The subtle theories of human ears.
Their tongue is motion and they scorn the rhyme
And meter made by men to soothe their fears.
COUNTRY GIRL
Your face is stencilled with a pensiveness.
Your face contains a minor lyric trapped
By dainty ignorance, and tamely capped
By hair as trimly lifeless as your dress.
You suffer from the drooling praise of old
And youthful men, who strive to win a blind
And soothing admiration from your mind,
And do not try to make your thoughts unfold.
Your face contains a minor lyric trapped
By dainty ignorance, and tamely capped
By hair as trimly lifeless as your dress.
You suffer from the drooling praise of old
And youthful men, who strive to win a blind
And soothing admiration from your mind,
And do not try to make your thoughts unfold.
NONDESCRIPT TYPIST
Within an office whose exterior
Resembles an ultra-conservative mind
You battle with the avaricious words
Of a meager, petrified man.
Your face is brown stagnation
Sometimes astounded by a thrust
Of chattering wistfulness.
Bravery is fear
Effectively sneering at itself,
And you are forever wavering
Upon the edge of this condition.
Yet your obscurity
Is an important atom
In the mysterious march of time.
Resembles an ultra-conservative mind
You battle with the avaricious words
Of a meager, petrified man.
Your face is brown stagnation
Sometimes astounded by a thrust
Of chattering wistfulness.
Bravery is fear
Effectively sneering at itself,
And you are forever wavering
Upon the edge of this condition.
Yet your obscurity
Is an important atom
In the mysterious march of time.
CONCERNING EMOTIONS
And if I say that pain is but
A circus barker whose loud cries
Seek to reward a trivial show,
Will you confess that I am wise?
A circus barker whose loud cries
Seek to reward a trivial show,
Will you confess that I am wise?
“Must it be emotional?” you asked,
After I had thrown
Words into a carnival-scope.
Sobriety and merriment
Borrowed the sixteenth century
Within your voice, and sought
The identity of sternness—
Mental sternness pretending to ignore
The confetti thrown by emotion
In a carnival unique.
After I had thrown
Words into a carnival-scope.
Sobriety and merriment
Borrowed the sixteenth century
Within your voice, and sought
The identity of sternness—
Mental sternness pretending to ignore
The confetti thrown by emotion
In a carnival unique.
Emotions can be prancing curves
Fashioned by relaxing thoughts.
Should I kiss you, Questioner,
The delicate anti-climax
Of a mental caper
Might perish on crimson vapor!
Tired of frenzies and satiations
Emotions often wander to poets
And ask for more fantastic decisions
For fire that glows but does not burn.
Fashioned by relaxing thoughts.
Should I kiss you, Questioner,
The delicate anti-climax
Of a mental caper
Might perish on crimson vapor!
Tired of frenzies and satiations
Emotions often wander to poets
And ask for more fantastic decisions
For fire that glows but does not burn.
METAPHYSICAL ELIZABETH
They gave you strait-jackets to bore you.
Like an unwilling promise
Your legs were tied together.
But people can only violate
Their own conception of reality,
And your actual curves
Preserved their sculptural liberty.
Leaving their semblance on your flesh
Your lines sped inward till they gained
The center where emotion changes
To a speck of quivering clarity.
Like an unwilling promise
Your legs were tied together.
But people can only violate
Their own conception of reality,
And your actual curves
Preserved their sculptural liberty.
Leaving their semblance on your flesh
Your lines sped inward till they gained
The center where emotion changes
To a speck of quivering clarity.
Within you phantoms of reality
Danced with plausibilities of mind,
Seeking to be consumed
By the oblivion which is understanding.
You feared that your return to motion
Would mean a succession of disappointments—
Tamely grazing arrows
Changed to wounds by the desiring heart
Take my hand and move.
Only two statues can stride together
In a manner invisible
Save to certain unreasonable adjustments
Of eyesight and of hearing.
Danced with plausibilities of mind,
Seeking to be consumed
By the oblivion which is understanding.
You feared that your return to motion
Would mean a succession of disappointments—
Tamely grazing arrows
Changed to wounds by the desiring heart
Take my hand and move.
Only two statues can stride together
In a manner invisible
Save to certain unreasonable adjustments
Of eyesight and of hearing.
DESCRIPTION AND EXHORTATION
Truly, this age will be known
As one of minute extremes
Courting an elderly shape
In a violent bar-room scene.
An Amazon made filthy by centuries,
And fuming pygmies, own the stage.
Thin furies of emotion
Name every color in the rainbow
Without its skillful assent,
And little mental skeletons
Stamp with clumsy weirdness
On effigies of the heart.
The pygmies often sneak
To the prancing Amazon
And the ensuing love-scene produces
Small memories of Walt Whitman.
As one of minute extremes
Courting an elderly shape
In a violent bar-room scene.
An Amazon made filthy by centuries,
And fuming pygmies, own the stage.
Thin furies of emotion
Name every color in the rainbow
Without its skillful assent,
And little mental skeletons
Stamp with clumsy weirdness
On effigies of the heart.
The pygmies often sneak
To the prancing Amazon
And the ensuing love-scene produces
Small memories of Walt Whitman.
This age is not metaphysical.
Followers of Dada,
Weary of electron-soliloquies
And fleshly ecstasies with flat feet,
Sit in the gallery
And throw loose malice at the display,
Evading their motives with an eager creed.
Followers of Dada,
Weary of electron-soliloquies
And fleshly ecstasies with flat feet,
Sit in the gallery
And throw loose malice at the display,
Evading their motives with an eager creed.
INEVITABLE
The insurrection of a flea
Compared to driving tusks
Of elephants, is just as strong.
Stupidity need not be long.
Compared to driving tusks
Of elephants, is just as strong.
Stupidity need not be long.
The insurrection of a flea
Attains philosophy and spice.
Fleas salt their eating with a creed
That warms the monotone of greed.
Attains philosophy and spice.
Fleas salt their eating with a creed
That warms the monotone of greed.
The insurrection of a flea
Will leave with tense insistence till
The suburbs of eternity.
O small fanatic on a spree.
Will leave with tense insistence till
The suburbs of eternity.
O small fanatic on a spree.
THE NEGROES WHO TURNED WHITE
The souls of negroes, thrown into a shout,
Roll their hallelujahs out
To the flashing blandness of the sky.
The sky does not divide their cries
Into meanings foolish and wise:
To the sky all men have but one cry.
Still, amusement has often thrown
Separate shades upon the monotone,
Playing with the sleep of firm beliefs.
Amused, we give these negroes forms
Distinct and bounding under storms
Of sounds that catapult their joys and griefs.
A negro with his bald despair
Seduced by remnants of silver hair,
Converses with an old King known as God.
He longs to have his tortured stare
Rewarded with a golden chair
While other negroes thump the sod
With heavy echoes of his request.
With a cold, castrated zest
He pleads for rest, and he is bold,
While scientists and troubadours
Cling more closely to their floors.
Roll their hallelujahs out
To the flashing blandness of the sky.
The sky does not divide their cries
Into meanings foolish and wise:
To the sky all men have but one cry.
Still, amusement has often thrown
Separate shades upon the monotone,
Playing with the sleep of firm beliefs.
Amused, we give these negroes forms
Distinct and bounding under storms
Of sounds that catapult their joys and griefs.
A negro with his bald despair
Seduced by remnants of silver hair,
Converses with an old King known as God.
He longs to have his tortured stare
Rewarded with a golden chair
While other negroes thump the sod
With heavy echoes of his request.
With a cold, castrated zest
He pleads for rest, and he is bold,
While scientists and troubadours
Cling more closely to their floors.
“How d’yah kno-ow, how d’yah kno-o-ow
Dat the blood done sign mah na-a-ame?
Yes it’s so-o-o, yes it’s so-o-o,
Jesus wrote it down in fla-a-ame.”
Dat the blood done sign mah na-a-ame?
Yes it’s so-o-o, yes it’s so-o-o,
Jesus wrote it down in fla-a-ame.”
The other negroes sing
With gliding fear, and swing
The child-like joke of their arms to emotions
That surge like an army searching for its eyes.
But suddenly a quick surprise
Tricks each negro’s face with fright—
Their skins are gleaming pink and white.
White philosophers and scientists
Strike each other with dubious fists
Within the negroes’ brains, while poets fight
Like blistered urchins wrapped in gloom.
Shrinking underneath the uproar
With its bursts of phantom gore,
The negroes shriek against their doom.
With bending celebration of knees
They crush against their leader’s pleas.
With gliding fear, and swing
The child-like joke of their arms to emotions
That surge like an army searching for its eyes.
But suddenly a quick surprise
Tricks each negro’s face with fright—
Their skins are gleaming pink and white.
White philosophers and scientists
Strike each other with dubious fists
Within the negroes’ brains, while poets fight
Like blistered urchins wrapped in gloom.
Shrinking underneath the uproar
With its bursts of phantom gore,
The negroes shriek against their doom.
With bending celebration of knees
They crush against their leader’s pleas.
EXPRESSIONS ON A CHILD’S FACE
Dawn?—no, the hunted transparency of dawn
Curving from the white throat of a child
And shaken in the still cup of his face.
Then a sudden dispersal of swerving light
Carrying away the defeated
Wisdom of a smile.
Curving from the white throat of a child
And shaken in the still cup of his face.
Then a sudden dispersal of swerving light
Carrying away the defeated
Wisdom of a smile.
Thought?—no, the persistent shudder
Of emotion that is almost thought.
The invisible recklessness of perfume
Enveloping the beginning of a question.
Of emotion that is almost thought.
The invisible recklessness of perfume
Enveloping the beginning of a question.
PSYCHIC CLOWNS
First Clown
We gaze upon a negro shoveling coal.
His muscles fuse into a poem
Stifled and sinister,
Censuring the happy rhetoric of morning air.
Some day he will pitch the stretched simplicity
Of his tent upon the contented ruins
Of a civilization,
Playing with documents and bottles of perfume
Found in deserted, broken corridors.
We gaze upon a negro shoveling coal.
His muscles fuse into a poem
Stifled and sinister,
Censuring the happy rhetoric of morning air.
Some day he will pitch the stretched simplicity
Of his tent upon the contented ruins
Of a civilization,
Playing with documents and bottles of perfume
Found in deserted, broken corridors.
Second Clown
The barbarous comedy
Lost in profuse confessions
And often described as life,
Lends an attitude of conviction
To the mechanical retreat of time.
The barbarous comedy
Lost in profuse confessions
And often described as life,
Lends an attitude of conviction
To the mechanical retreat of time.
First Clown
Do you hear beneath the irregular strut
Of this city an imperceptible groan?
Time is turning the jail-house key.
They build larger jails for time;
He makes larger keys of blood-stained iron.
Endlessly he emerges
From complicated delusions of freedom.
Do you hear beneath the irregular strut
Of this city an imperceptible groan?
Time is turning the jail-house key.
They build larger jails for time;
He makes larger keys of blood-stained iron.
Endlessly he emerges
From complicated delusions of freedom.
Second Clown
That desperately grotesque
Wanton known as imagination
Can plunge beyond both men and time.
Imagination slips down
Upon the last edges of thought and feeling
And teaches them to transcend
The forlorn bravado of swinging legs and arms.
That desperately grotesque
Wanton known as imagination
Can plunge beyond both men and time.
Imagination slips down
Upon the last edges of thought and feeling
And teaches them to transcend
The forlorn bravado of swinging legs and arms.
DEAR MINNA
Catastrophe in a bric-a-brac shop.
The proprietor lies murdered.
Pieces of cups, jars, and vases
Have attained the disorderly freedom
So obnoxious to bankrupt fanatics.
Once the cups, jars, and vases
Were symmetrical and empty,
And immersed in the task of holding nothing.
Now they have snatched a voice from fragments;
Spell many an accidental sentence;
Renounce the hollow lie.
Death, you take the stiffly obvious shapes
Of objects and crack them with your fingers—
A shattered invitation
To curiosity and anticipation—
And I am grateful to you for that.
My eyes grow weary scanning the living array.
Each man takes his inch upon the shelves
And will not move, until your paw
Robs him of microscopical convictions.
The proprietor lies murdered.
Pieces of cups, jars, and vases
Have attained the disorderly freedom
So obnoxious to bankrupt fanatics.
Once the cups, jars, and vases
Were symmetrical and empty,
And immersed in the task of holding nothing.
Now they have snatched a voice from fragments;
Spell many an accidental sentence;
Renounce the hollow lie.
Death, you take the stiffly obvious shapes
Of objects and crack them with your fingers—
A shattered invitation
To curiosity and anticipation—
And I am grateful to you for that.
My eyes grow weary scanning the living array.
Each man takes his inch upon the shelves
And will not move, until your paw
Robs him of microscopical convictions.
Dear Minna, read the newspapers
And gloat with me over death’s industry.
Banker, Freudian, Socialist,
Knocked from the shelves and changed
To symbols that can lure conjecture.
It is well that we are metaphysical.
Death must not become
A mere black frame surrounding
The memorized reiterations.
Death must remain an irresistible
Beckoning to reckless speculations
And continue to offer an amorous arm
To the recalcitrant antics of words.
And gloat with me over death’s industry.
Banker, Freudian, Socialist,
Knocked from the shelves and changed
To symbols that can lure conjecture.
It is well that we are metaphysical.
Death must not become
A mere black frame surrounding
The memorized reiterations.
Death must remain an irresistible
Beckoning to reckless speculations
And continue to offer an amorous arm
To the recalcitrant antics of words.
VILLAGE CLERK
Rabelais and Maeterlinck
Have subsided to one grin
Upon your sharply cumbersome face.
Coarseness and a psychic hope
Dominate your voice
As you prattle to women
Purchasing sugar and salt.
Then your face and voice
Alter to a serious fraud
Eagerly learning the technique of deceptions,
As you answer this dryly emasculated
Grey-beard, discussing the tendencies in hogs.
Have subsided to one grin
Upon your sharply cumbersome face.
Coarseness and a psychic hope
Dominate your voice
As you prattle to women
Purchasing sugar and salt.
Then your face and voice
Alter to a serious fraud
Eagerly learning the technique of deceptions,
As you answer this dryly emasculated
Grey-beard, discussing the tendencies in hogs.
REALISM
Regard an American farm.
That jaded collaborator,
Daylight, has just arrived.
Wavy signal of smoke
From the wooden farm-house disappears
Beneath the bluely ascetic lack of interest.
Horses, pigs, and cows
Assemble their discontent.
The result is a Chinese orchestra
Devoid of discipline and cohesion,
With all of the players intoxicated.
The animals do not realize
That their voices should portray
The farmer in the angular house;
The hackneyed prose of his life;
The expanding soul of his corn-fields.
Turn from the absence of human wisdom
And see the lights in the farm-house.
Dimly circumscribed and steady,
They symbolize future events.
The farm-hand walks to the barn,
With an ox-like dragging of feet.
Black shirt, and overalls
Whose color has been removed by dirt,
Obscure the heavy knots of his body.
His cork-screw nose ascends
To the eyes of an unperturbed pig.
Love and hate to him
Are mouthfuls of coarse food hastily gulped
During lulls in his muscular slavery.
Beneath the slanting pungency
Of the barn he vanishes,
And with meaningless sounds
He pays his meager tribute to life.
Then the farmer persuades his age
To indulge in an unwilling stumble
Across the yard.
His grey beard is the end of a rope
That has gradually throttled his face.
Within him, avarice
Is awkwardly practising the rhythms
Of weak emotions benignly, belatedly
Preparing for celestial rewards.
Within the cluttered farm-yard
He stands, a figure of niggardly order.
That jaded collaborator,
Daylight, has just arrived.
Wavy signal of smoke
From the wooden farm-house disappears
Beneath the bluely ascetic lack of interest.
Horses, pigs, and cows
Assemble their discontent.
The result is a Chinese orchestra
Devoid of discipline and cohesion,
With all of the players intoxicated.
The animals do not realize
That their voices should portray
The farmer in the angular house;
The hackneyed prose of his life;
The expanding soul of his corn-fields.
Turn from the absence of human wisdom
And see the lights in the farm-house.
Dimly circumscribed and steady,
They symbolize future events.
The farm-hand walks to the barn,
With an ox-like dragging of feet.
Black shirt, and overalls
Whose color has been removed by dirt,
Obscure the heavy knots of his body.
His cork-screw nose ascends
To the eyes of an unperturbed pig.
Love and hate to him
Are mouthfuls of coarse food hastily gulped
During lulls in his muscular slavery.
Beneath the slanting pungency
Of the barn he vanishes,
And with meaningless sounds
He pays his meager tribute to life.
Then the farmer persuades his age
To indulge in an unwilling stumble
Across the yard.
His grey beard is the end of a rope
That has gradually throttled his face.
Within him, avarice
Is awkwardly practising the rhythms
Of weak emotions benignly, belatedly
Preparing for celestial rewards.
Within the cluttered farm-yard
He stands, a figure of niggardly order.