The Flame Read online

  and until now, sadder

  the flowers hate us

  the animals pray for us to die

  as soon as i found out

  i murdered my dog

  They hate us

  They pray for us to die

  Wake up America

  Murder your dog

  UNBIBLICAL

  I thought I’d get away

  But now I have to stay

  I think I’d better say:

  As usual

  It wasn’t up to me

  I heard the stern decree

  I wasn’t meant to be

  That beautiful

  Some people catch the bus

  They’re luckier than us

  In spite of all the fuss

  They’re credible

  They want to get on board

  They don’t like to be ignored

  They’re children of the lord

  They’re terrible

  You’ve heard this all before

  I had some but they had more

  I was rotten to the core

  But merciful

  And that was my mistake

  I didn’t kill the snake

  I gave the snake a break

  Unbiblical

  WINTER ON MOUNT BALDY

  It’s winter on Mount Baldy

  The monks are shoveling snow

  It’s swinging free, the Gateless Gate

  But no one seems to go

  It’s cold and dark and dangerous

  And slippery as a lie

  Nobody wants to be here

  And me, I’d rather die

  All the food is second-hand

  And everyone complains

  The priceless shit of yesteryear

  Is frozen in the drains

  It’s winter on Mount Baldy

  The monks are shoveling snow

  It’s swinging free, the Gateless Gate

  But no one seems to go

  Forget about your purity

  Your blemishes and stains

  You want to climb Mount Baldy

  You’re going to need your chains

  It’s cold and dark and dangerous

  And slippery as a lie

  Nobody wants to be here

  Some say they’d rather die

  You had the Himalayas

  And the great Tibetan plains

  You want to take Mount Baldy

  You’re going to need your chains

  August 21, 2015

  DOESN’T MATTER

  it doesn’t matter darling,

  it really doesn’t matter,

  and i don’t say

  it doesn’t matter,

  in order to hurt you into feeling:

  that it DOES MATTER,

  that it REALLY DOES MATTER.

  not at all,

  not at all.

  i stand beside you

  in the midst of this vast enterprise

  of human activity and desire,

  deafened by the noise

  of my own heart,

  twisted by an appetite

  for justice and for peace,

  and i look at you,

  the one i tried to love,

  the one who tried to love me,

  and it comes to us

  from the place where we began,

  the place where we will end,

  a voice that includes

  your voice, and my voice,

  and we are

  gathered together,

  we are born together,

  and we die in each other’s arms,

  and it is heard as a mighty voice,

  or a gentle voice,

  a whispered voice,

  or a thundered voice,

  above all,

  the voice that we most

  desperately

  long to hear,

  it is the voice that can forgive us,

  and it says,

  it doesn’t matter

  darling,

  it is the truth,

  the truth of all forgiving.

  listen now. listen from

  the wreck of your baffled love.

  it is the truth,

  the very truth

  of all forgiving.

  it doesn’t matter darling.

  it really doesn’t matter.

  GRATEFUL

  The huge mauve jacaranda tree

  down the street on South Tremaine

  in full bloom

  two stories high

  It made me so happy

  And then

  the first cherries of the season

  at the Palisades Farmers Market

  Sunday morning

  “What a blessing!”

  I exclaimed to Anjani

  And then the samples on waxed paper

  of the banana cream cake

  and the coconut cream cake

  I am not a lover of pastry

  but I recognized the genius of the baker

  and touched my hat to her

  A slight chill in the air

  seemed to polish the sunlight

  and confer the status of beauty

  to every object I beheld

  Faces bosoms fruits pickles green eggs

  newborn babies

  in clever expensive harnesses

  I am so grateful

  to my new anti-depressant

  ANTIQUE SONG

  Too old, too old to play the part,

  Too old, God only knows!

  I’ll keep the little silver heart,

  The red and folded rose.

  And in the arms of someone strong

  You’ll have what we had none.

  I’ll finish up my winter song

  For you. It’s almost done.

  But oh! the kisses that we kissed,

  That swept me to the shore

  Of seas where hardly I exist,

  Except to kiss you more.

  I have the little silver heart,

  The red and folded rose.

  The one you gave me at the start,

  The other at the close.

  He waited for you all night long.

  Go run to him, go run.

  I’ll finish up my winter song,

  For you. It’s almost done.

  ELEVATOR MIRRORS

  My father had a mustache,

  But not his father or his brothers

  I am very tempted

  In the new hotels

  The elevators are often so dark

  The mirrors are useless

  (Like this one)

  I don’t want to go anywhere

  I’ve been to the Acropolis (1959)

  I sat on the old stones

  And was photographed with a woman (1970)

  Who troubled my life

  From then until now (2008)

  Dying in reasonable circumstances

  Is mostly what I hope for

  But here I am on the road

  Far from reasonable circumstances

  There is a woman I like

  She is young and beautiful and kind

  And cannot sing

  But she wants to be a singer

  I used to keep a full picture of her

  Hidden on my laptop

  Then I thought:

  I can’t do this again

  And I dragged it (reluctantly)

  To the little trash basket

  Which I did not empty for quite a while

  In the elevator

  Of the Manchester Malmaison Hotel

  I have to put on reading glasses

  To find the button for my floor

  The corridors are dark purple

  Lit with pinpoint lights

  Bass-heavy hip-hop

  Dooming the generation

  From hidden speakers

  You squint to find your door

  (The entire enterprise

  Of travel and lodging

  Now pitched

&nbs
p; As a dangerous erotic adventure)

  I’m no one to say

  Who can or can’t be a singer

  God knows my own credentials

  Were not extensive

  It was Good Fortune

  As success always is

  Period

  (A really lovely person

  I don’t have to introduce

  To anyone at Sony)

  LISTEN TO THE HUMMINGBIRD

  Listen to the hummingbird

  Whose wings you cannot see

  Listen to the hummingbird

  Don’t listen to me.

  Listen to the butterfly

  Whose days but number three

  Listen to the butterfly

  Don’t listen to me.

  Listen to the one in charge

  Who studies your ID

  Listen to the one in charge

  Don’t listen to me.

  Listen to the sovereign heart

  Resign its sovereignty

  Listen to the sovereign heart

  Don’t listen to me.

  Listen to the mind of God

  Which doesn’t need to be

  Listen to the mind of God

  Don’t listen to me.

  I THINK I’LL BLAME

  I think I’ll blame

  my death on you

  but I don’t know you

  well enough

  if I did

  we’d be married now

  For the full enjoyment

  (and I promise you

  there is such a thing)

  it is not enough to read

  between the lines

  that is child’s play

  and we are not that fond

  of children

  One day

  you will pick up this book

  as if

  for the first time

  and say to yourself:

  I don’t know how the guy

  pulled it off

  Line after line

  rises from my predicament—

  the nerve, you’ll say

  the fucking nerve

  And strengthened by

  your indifference

  to the matter

  not to mention

  the entire question of the

  past

  You will recall

  how good you were to me

  how good I was to you

  And standing at some

  commanding place

  like a window or a cliff

  you will know

  the full enjoyment

  MY GUITAR STOOD UP TODAY

  My guitar stood up today

  and leaped into my arms to play

  a Spanish tune for dancers proud

  to stamp their feet and cry aloud

  against the fate that bends us down

  beneath the thorny bloody crown

  of sickness, age, and paranoid

  delusions I, for one, cannot avoid

  MY CAREER

  So little to say

  So urgent

  to say it

  NEVER GAVE NOBODY TROUBLE

  i couldn’t pay the mortgage

  and i broke my baby’s heart

  i couldn’t pay the mortgage

  and i broke my baby’s heart

  never gave nobody trouble

  but it ain’t too late to start

  don’t want to break no window

  don’t want to burn no car

  don’t want to break no window

  don’t want to burn your car

  you got a right to all your riches

  but you let it go too far

  you sail the mighty ocean

  in a yacht designed for you

  you sail the mighty ocean

  in a yacht designed for you

  but the ocean’s thick with garbage

  you ain’t going to make it through

  never gave nobody trouble

  i’m a law and order man

  never gave nobody trouble

  i’m a law and order man

  never gave nobody trouble

  but you know damn well I can

  ORDINARY GUY WITH PROBLEMS

  Ordinary guy with problems

  You’ve seen him around

  Some of the places you go

  He’s not caving in

  Don’t have to be nice to him

  He knows where to get a drink

  He can be alone

  Ordinary guy with problems

  DRANK A LOT

  i drank a lot. i lost my job.

  i lived like nothing mattered.

  then you stopped, and came across

  my little bridge of fallen answers.

  i don’t recall what happened next.

  i kept you at a distance.

  but tangled in the knot of sex

  my punishment was lifted.

  and lifted on a single breath—

  no coming and no going—

  o G-d, you are the only friend

  i never thought of knowing.

  your remedies beneath my hand

  your fingers in my hair

  the kisses on our lips began

  that ended everywhere.

  and now our sins are all confessed

  our strategies forgiven

  it’s written that the law must rest

  before the law is written.

  and not because of what i’d lost

  and not for what i’d mastered

  you stopped for me, and came across

  the bridge of fallen answers.

  tho’ mercy has no point of view

  and no one’s here to suffer

  we cry aloud, as humans do:

  we cry to one another.

  And now it’s one, and now it’s two,

  And now the whole disaster.

  We cry for help, as humans do—

  Before the truth, and after.

  And Every Guiding Light Was Gone

  And Every Teacher Lying—

  There Was No Truth In Moving On—

  There Was No Truth In Dying.

  And Then The Night Commanded Me

  To Enter In Her Side—

  And Be As Adam Was To Eve

  Before The Great Divide.

  her remedies beneath my hand

  her fingers in my hair—

  and every mouth of hunger glad—

  and deeply unaware.

  and here i cannot lift a hand

  to trace the lines of beauty,

  but lines are traced, and beauty’s glad

  to come and go so freely.

  and from the wall a grazing wind,

  weightless and routine—

  it wounds us as i part your lips

  it wounds us in between.

  and every guiding light was gone

  and every sweet direction—

  the book of love i read was wrong

  it had a happy ending.

  And Now There Is No Point Of View—

  And Now There Is No Other—

  We Spread And Drown As Lilies Do—

  We Spread And Drown Forever.

  You are my tongue, you are my eye,

  My coming and my going.

  O G-d, you let your sailor die

  So he could be the ocean.

  And when I’m at my hungriest

  She takes away my tongue

  And holds me here where hungers rest

  Before the world is born.

  And fastened here we cannot move

  We cannot move forever

  We spread and drown as lilies do—

  From nowhere to the center.

  Escaping through a secret gate

  I made it to the border

  And call it luck—or call it fate—

  I left my house in order.

  And now there is no point of view—

  And now there is no other—

  We spread and drown as lilies do—
r />   We spread and drown forever.

  Disguised as one who lived in peace

  I made it to the border

  Though every atom of my heart

  Was burning with desire.

  Sunday, March 7, 2004

  IKKYU

  Ikkyu

  is not a monk,

  not much of a poet,

  and as a lover,

  it’s hit and run.

  He’d need

  a hundred years of America,

  and a long shower

  just to keep his hand in.

  FLYING OVER ICELAND

  over Reykjavik, the “smokey bay”

  where W.H. Auden went

  to discover the background

  of all our songs,

  where I myself was received

  by the Mayor and the President

  (600 miles an hour

  30,000 feet

  599 miles an hour

  my old street number on Belmont Ave)

  where I, a second-rater

  by any estimation,

  was honoured by the noblest

  and handsomest people of the West

  served with lobster

  and strong drink,

  and I never cared about eyes

  but the eyes of the waitress

  were so alarmingly mauve

  that I fell into a trance

  and ate the forbidden shellfish

  G-D WANTS HIS SONG

  Vanessa called

  all the way from Toronto

  she said that I

  could count on her

  if ever I was

  down and out

  After I put the phone down

  i played the six-holed wooden flute

  she gave me

  on the occasion of our parting

  i figured out the fingering

  and I played it better

  than I had ever done

  Tears came out of my eyes

  because of the music

  and the recollection

  of her extraordinary beauty

  which no one could avoid

  and because she said

  there was a missing song

  and I had been employed

  ALL HE KNOWS

  All he knows

  is that this has happened before—

  this moment, next moment, last moment.

  It is playing a second time,

  maybe a third.

  Yes, a third time.

  He remembers remembering it.

  Hydra,

  August 1999

  IF I TOOK A PILL

  If I took a pill

  I’d feel you so much better

  I’d write you a poem

  That sounds like a letter

  I’d kill someone mean

  And I’d cut off his ear

  And I’d send it to you

  With “I wish you were here”

  I’m trying to finish