O.

the poets have always preceded,

as Mallarmé preceded Cézanne,

neck and neck that was no

privilege, sweet and forgotten

seated in chairs, the afternoon

marches along with the shadows

which are not bougainvillaea but

northern I have always loved

shadows as long as they were northern

and moved gently west like the

crack-up of books, their spines

tingling with notes and stuffing

most people remember the gardens

with cement flowers and the

house going straight up like

solidified swimming-pools or lilies

when you get to the top which

they once called widow’s walk,

you wait in nothing but your garden

hat, beautifully otherwise naked

for the wind-swept sea and the dying

sweetness or womb, declaring the completion

of philosophy or the completion of

the human-being in some/a history

awash among silver trees, aspens,

pounded, whispering ‘my foos won’t

moos’ or some other difficult

disappearance of words which were

preliminary notions, laundry of that lovely

absurd summer we wanted so

desperately the moss was 6 inches

deep and if you put a cigarette

out in it, the fire would be

6 inches deep in minutes,

when the fire spreads, the trees

totter and their statues wait

in your thought, exactly numerous