O Ye Tongues

First Psalm

Let there be a god as large as a sunlamp to laugh his heat at you.

Let there be an earth with a form like a jigsaw and let it fit for all of ye.

Let there be the darkness of a darkroom out of the deep. A worm room.

Let there be a God who sees light at the end of a long thin pipe and lets it in.

Let God divide them in half.

Let God share his Hoodsie.

Let the waters divide so that God may wash his face in first light.

Let there be pin holes in the sky in which God puts his little finger.

Let the stars be a heaven of jelly rolls and babies laughing.

Let light be called Day so that men may grow corn or take busses.

Let there be on the second day dry land so that all men may dry their toes with Cannon towels.

Let God call this earth and feel the grasses rise up like angel hair.

Let there be bananas, cucumbers, prunes, mangoes, beans, rice and candy canes.

Let them seed and reseed.

Let there be seasons so that we may learn the architecture of the sky with eagles, finches, flickers, seagulls.

Let there be seasons so that we may put on twelve coats and shovel snow or take off our skins and bathe in the Carribean.

Let there be seasons so the sky dogs will jump across the sun in December.

Let there be seasons so that the eel may come out of her green cave.

Let there be seasons so that the raccoon may raise his blood level.

Let there be seasons so that the wind may be hoisted for an orange leaf.

Let there be seasons so that the rain will bury many ships.

Let there be seasons so that the miracles will fill our drinking glass with runny gold.

Let there be seasons so that our tongues will be rich in asparagus and limes.

Let there be seasons so that fires will not forsake us and turn to metal.

Let there be seasons so that a man may close his palm on a woman's breast and bring forth a sweet nipple, a starberry.

Let there be a heaven so that man may outlive his grasses.



Second Psalm

For I pray there is an Almighty to bless the Piss Oak that surrounds me.

For I pray that there is an Almighty to bless the Dalmations that jump like sun spots.

For I pray that Emily King, whom I do not know except to saygood morning, will observe my legs and fanny with good will.

For I pray that John F. Kennedy will forgive me for stealing his free-from-the-Senate Manila envelope.

For I pray that my honorary degree from Tufts is not making John Holmes stick out his tongue from the brackish grave in Medford.

For I pray that J. Brussel who writes that he is four score and more will prosper over his morning cock.

For I pray that joy will unbend from her stone back and that the snakes will heat up her vertebrae.

For I pray that Mama Brundig, good doctor, will find rest at night after my yelling her name on the corner of Beacon and Dartmouth.

For I pray that this red wool suit that itches will come off for a nylon nighty.

For I pray that man, through the awful fog, will find my daughter proud although in Hawaii.

For I pray that my daughters will touch the faces of their daughters with bunny fur.

For I pray that my typewriter, ever faithful, will not break even though I threw it across the hospital room six years ago.

For I pray that Kayo who smiles from the photo above me from his lawn chair in Bermuda will smile at his name among tongues.

For I pray that the wooden room I live in will faithfully hold more books as the years pass.

For I pray that my apparel, my socks and my coats will not shrink any longer.

For I pray my two cats will enter heaven carrying their eyes in little tin sand pails.

For I pray that my wine will fatten.

For she prays that her touch will be milk.

For she prays that her night will be a small closed path.

For I pray that I may continue to stuff cheese potatoes in my mouth.

For I pray that Jack Daniels will go down as easily as a kiss.

For she prays that she will not cringe at the loneliness of the exile in Hamilton.

For she prays that she will not cringe at the death hole.

For I pray that God will digest me.



Third Psalm

Let Noah build an ark out of the old lady's shoe and fill it with the creatures of the Lord.

Let the ark of salvation have many windows so the creatures of the Lord will marry mouthfuls of oxygen.

Let the ark of salvation do homage to the Lord and notch his belt repeatedly.

Let Anne and Christopher kneel with a buzzard whose mouth will bite her toe so that she may offer it up.

Let Anne and Christopher appear with two robins whose worms are sweet and pink as lipstick.

Let them present a bee, cupped in their palms, zinging the electricity of the Lord out into little yellow Z's.

Let them give praise with a bull whose horns are yellow with history.

Praise the Lord with an ox who grows sweet in heaven and ties the hair ribbons of little girls.

Humble themselves with the fly buzzing like the mother of the engine.

Serve with the ape who tore down the Empire State Building and won the maid.

Dedicate an ant who will crawl toward the Lord like the print of this page.

Bless with a sable who bleeds ink across the dresses of ladies of the court.

Bless with a rabbit who comes with a whole sackful of sperm.

Bless with the locust who dances a curtain over the sky and makes the field blind.

Bless with the kingfish who melts down dimes into slim silver beside Frisco.

Rejoice with the day lily for it is born for a day to live by the mailbox and glorify the roadside.

Rejoice with the olive for it gives forth a faithful oil and eaten alone it will grease the mouth and bury the teeth.

Rejoice with a French angelfish which floats by like a jewel glowing like a blue iceberg in the Carribean.

Rejoice with a cottonbush which grows stars and seeds to clothe the multitudes of america.

Rejoice with the sea horse who lives in amusement parks and poems.

Let Anne and Christopher rejoice with the worm who moves into the light like a doll's penis.



Fourth Psalm

For I am an orphan with two death masks on the mantel and came from the grave of my mama's belly into the commerce of Boston.

For there were only two windows on the city and the buildings ate me.

For I was swaddled in grease wool from my father's company and could not move or ask the time.

For Anne and Christopher were born in my head as I howled at the grave of the roses, the ninety-four rose crèches of my bedroom.

For Christopher, my imaginary brother, my twin holding his baby cock like a minnow.

For I became aweand this imaginarywebecame a kind company when the big balloons did not bend over us.

For I could not read or speak and on the long nights I could not turn the moon off or count the lights of cars across the ceiling.

For I lay as pale as flour and drank moon juice from a rubber tip.

For I wet my pants and Christopher told the clock and it ticked like a July cricket and silently moved its spoons.

For I shat and Christopher smiled and said let the air be sweet with your soil.

For I listened to Christopher unless the balloon came and changed my bandage.

For my crotch itched and hands oiled it.

For I lay as single as death. Christopher lay beside me. He was living.

For I lay as stiff as paper roses and Christopher took a tin basin and bathed me.

For I spoke not but the magician played me tricks of the blood.

For I heard not but for the magician lying beside me playing like a radio.

For I cried then and my little box wiggled with melancholy.

For I was in a boundary of wool and painted boards. Where are we Christopher? Jail, he said.

For the room itself was a box. Four thick walls of roses. A ceiling Christopher found low and menacing.

For I smiled and there was no one to notice. Christopher was asleep. He was making a sea sound.

For I wiggled my fingers but they would not stay. I could not put them in place. They broke out of my mouth.

For I was prodding myself out of my sleep, out of the green room. The sleep of the desperate who travel backwards into darkness.

For birth was a disease and Christopher and I invented the cure.

For we swallow magic and we deliver Anne.



Fifth Psalm

Let Christopher and Anne come forth with a pig as bold as an assistant professor. He who comes forth from soil and the subway makes poison sweet.

Let them come forth with a mole who has come from the artificial anus into the light to swallow the sun.

Come forth with a daisy who opens like a hand and wants to be counted forhe loves me.

Come forth with an orange who will turn its flashlight on and glow in the dark like something holy.

Come forth with a snail who ties and unties his brain within a hard skull. No one sends a letter to the snail.

Let Christopher and Anne come forth with a squid who will come bringing his poison to wash over the Lord like melted licorice.

Come forth with a cauliflower who will plunk herself down beside Him and worry like a white brain.

Come forth with a rose who unfolds like nether lips and is a languid delight.

Come forth with a daffodil who is got up as a ballerina and who dances out into the ancient spring.

Come forth with a dog who is spotted and smiling and holds up his paw for the awful stars.

Come forth with a cockroach large enough to be Franz Kafka (may he rest in peace though locked in his room). Surely all who are locked in boxes of different sizes should have their hands held. Trains and planes should not be locked. One should be allowed to fly out of them and into the Lord's mouth. The Lord is my shepherd, He will swallow me. The lord is my shepherd, He will allow me back out.

Let Christopher and Anne come forth with a carp who is two-thirds too large to fit anywhere happy.

Come with a leopard who seeps like oil across the branch and has cotton batten for paws.

Come with the Mediterranean on a sunny day where the stars sleep one inch below the surface.

Come with a tree-frog who is more important to the field than Big Ben. He should not be locked in.



Sixth Psalm

For America is a lady rocking on a porch in an unpainted house on an unused road but Anne does not see it.

For America is a librarian in Wichita coughing dust and sharing sourballs with the postman.

For America is Dr. Abraham passing out penicillin and sugar pills to the town of Woolrich, Pennsylvania.

For America is an old man washing his feet in Albion, Michigan. Drying them carefully and applying Dr. Scholl's foot powder. But Anne does not see it. Anne is locked in.

For America is a reformed burglar turned locksmith who pulls up the shades of his shop at nine a.m. daily (except Sunday when he leaves his phone number on the shop door).

For America is a fat woman dusting a grand piano in english Creek, New Jersey.

For America is a suede glove manufacturer sitting in his large swivel chair feeling the goods and assessing his assets and debits.

For America is a bus driver in Embarrass, Minnesota, clocking the miles and watching the little cardboard suitcases file by.

For America is a land of Commies and Prohibitionists but Anne does not see it. Anne is locked in. The Trotskyites don't see her. The Republicans have never tweaked her chin for she is not there. Anne hides inside folding and unfolding rose after rose. She has no one. She has Christopher. They sit in their room pinching the dolls' noses, poking the dolls' eyes. One time they gave a doll a ride in a fuzzy slipper but that was too far, too far wasn't it. Anne did not dare. She put the slipper with the doll inside it as in a car right into the closet and pushed the door shut.

For America is the headlight man at the Ford plant in Detroit, Michigan, he of the wires, he of the white globe, all day, all day, all year, all his year's headlights, seventy a day, improved by automation, but Anne does not.

For America is a miner in Ohio, slipping into the dark hole and bringing forth cat's eyes each night.

For America is only this room . . . there is no useful activity.

For America only your dolls are cheerful.



Seventh Psalm

Let all rejoice with a boa whose twenty feet loosen the tree and the rock and coil like a rubber rope.

Rejoice with the Postmaster General who sits at his desk in Washington and draws faces on the stamps.

Bring forth the vulture who is a meat watcher from the clouds.

Give praise with the spider who builds a city out of her toes.

Rejoice with the Japanese beetle who feasts on rose petals, those mouths of honey.

Rejoice with Peter Pan who flies gold to the crocodile.

Rejoice with the sea otter who floats on her back and carries her young on her tummy.

Give praise with the lobster who is the almighty picker-upper and is still fine to the tongue.

Rejoice with the oyster who lies safely in his hard-nosed shell and who can be eaten alive.

Rejoice with the panda bear who hugs himself.

Rejoice with the roach who is despised among creatures and yet allowed his ugly place.

Rejoice with the anchovy who darts in and out of salads.

Give praise with the barnacle who cements himself to the rock and lets the waves feed him green stuff.

Give praise with the whale who will make a big warm home for Jonah and let him hang his very own pictures up.

Give praise with the grape for lovers will wear them on their toes.

Rejoice with the potato which is a sweet lover and made of angel-mattresses.

Rejoice with broccoli for it is a good bush-of-a-face and goes nicely in the mouth.

Let Christopher and Anne rejoice with Winston Churchill and his hot and cold Blitz.

Let them rejoice with the speedboat that skims by, leaving white lines behind it, making the sea a tennis court for a minute.



Eighth Psalm

No. No. The woman is cheerful, she smiles at her stomach. She has swallowed a bagful of oranges and is well pleased.

For she has come through the voyage fit and her room carries the little people.

For she has outlived the dates in the back of Fords, she has outlived the penises of her teens to come here, to the married harbor.

For she is the forbidden one, telling time by her ten long fingers.

For she is the dangerous hills and many a climber will be lost on such a passage.

For she is lost from mankind; she is knitting her own hair into a baby shawl.

For she is stuffed by Christopher into a neat package that will not undo until the weeks pass.

For she is a magnitude, she is many. She is each of us patting ourselves dry with a towel.

For she is nourished by darkness.

For she is in the dark room putting bones into place.

For she is clustering the gold and the silver, the minerals and the chemicals.

For she is a hoarder, she puts away silks and wools and lips and small white eyes.

For she is seeing the end of her confinement now and is waiting like a stone for the waters.

For the baby crowns and there is a people-dawn in the world.

For the baby lies in its water and blood and there is a people-cry in the world.

For the baby suckles and there is a people made of milk for her to use. There are milk trees to hiss her on. There are milk beds in which to lie and dream of a warm room. There are milk fingers to fold and unfold. There are milk bottoms that are wet and caressed and put into their cotton.

For there are many worlds of milk to walk through under the moon.

For the baby grows and the mother places her giggle-jog on her knee and sings a song of Christopher and Anne.

For the mother sings songs of the baby that knew.

For the mother remembers the baby she was and never locks or twists or puts lonely into a foreign place.

For the baby lives. The mother will die and when she does Christopher will go with her. Christopher who stabbed his kisses and cried up to make two out of one.



Ninth Psalm

Let the chipmunk praise the Lord as he bounds up Jacob's Ladder.

Let the airplane praise the Lord as she flirts with the kingdom.

Let the Good Fairy praise with her heavy bagful of dimes.

Let them praise with a garbage can for all who are cast out.

Praise with a basketball as it enters God's mouth.

Praise with a lemon peel as it floats in the president's drink.

Praise with an ice cube for it will hold up miniature polar bears for a second.

Serve with a sheep for it will crimp the Lord's beard with a curling iron.

Serve with a donkey to carry the worrying angel into Jerusalem.

Rejoice with a Mustang for it will dance down the highway and bump no one.

Appear with a flashlight so the stars will not get tired.

Bring forth a wheel to cart the dead into paradise.

Praise with a fork so that the angels may eat scrambled eggs on Sunday nights.

Come forth with an exit sign so that all those entering will know the way out.

Come forth with a homebody so that she may humble her mops on God's feet.

Come forth with an opera singer so that each concert she may let the moon out of her mouth.

Rejoice with the goldfish for it swallows the sunset from its little glass bowl.

Rejoice with a priest who swallows his collar like a tongue depressor.

Rejoice with a rabbi who combs his beard out like eel grass.

Bring forth a pigeon who will eat popcorn or toenail parings.



Tenth Psalm

For as the baby springs out like a starfish into her million light years Anne sees that she must climb her own mountain.

For as she eats wisdom like the halves of a pear she puts one foot in front of the other. She climbs the dark wing.

For as her child grows Anne grows and there is salt and cantaloupe and molasses for all.

For as Anne walks, the music walks and the family lies down in milk.

For I am not locked up.

For I am placing fist over fist on rock and plunging into the altitude of words. The silence of words.

For the husband sells his rain to God and God is well pleased with His family.

For they fling together against hardness and somewhere, in another room, a light is clicked on by gentle fingers.

For death comes to friends, to parents, to sisters. Death comes with its bagful of pain yet they do not curse the key they were given to hold.

For they open each door and it gives them a new day at the yellow window.

For the child grows into a woman, her breasts coming up like the moon while Anne rubs the peace stone.

For the child starts up her own mountain (not being locked in) and reaches the coastline of grapes.

For Anne and her daughter master the mountain and again and again. Then the child finds a man who opens like the sea.

For that daughter must build her own city and fill it with her own oranges, her own words.

For Anne walked up and up and finally over the years until she was old as the moon and with its naggy voice.

For Anne had climbed over eight mountains and saw the children washing the tiny statues in the square.

For Anne sat down with the blood of a hammer and built a tombstone for herself and Christopher sat beside her and was well pleased with their red shadow.

For they hung up a picture of a rat and the rat smiled and held out his hand.

For the rat was blessed on that mountain. He was given a white bath.

For the milk in the skies sank down upon them and tucked them in.

For God did not forsake them but put the blood angel to look after them until such a time as they would enter their star.

For the sky dogs jumped out and shoveled snow upon us and we lay in our quiet blood.

For God was as large as a sunlamp and laughed his heat at us and therefore we did not cringe at the death hole.