Then said Almitra, Speak to us of Love. And he raised his head and looked upon the people, and there fell a stillness upon them. And with a great voice he said: When love beckons to you, follow him, Though his ways are hard and steep. And when his wings enfold you yield to him,
Welcome to your day of sanity! Come in and close the door it will likely lock behind you and you will be home alone waste disposal will take care of your needs : at long last undisturbed phenomena without the heavy metal background of the street will be yours for observation and response : do you have visions? do you think? Your mouth do you open it for more than medication? I should know I know that I should know : we’ve watched centuries erode the fortress drain the moat the poet’s clumsy beast has reached its home and prey we wither in the gridlock of our power only the guns remain and are in use pure accident is beauty to be glimpsed your trembling only further clouds your sight I in my home you in your other place harmonize the fading anthem of an age the cracked bell of our liberty keeps time a penny for the corpse you left behind keep on recycling all that you have heard before call it a double bind much like the dead bolt that locked the door that keeps you safe and sane : ho — hum — harry who? oh that’s just a phrase found in a time capsule capped and sealed and shot up in the air : no I cannot tell you where it fell to earth that page was torn out years ago it’s chance that we have a fragment of that language left : do your archaeology before a mirror the canyons and the barren plains are clear but where to dig for a ruined golden age a fiction we were served with breakfast flakes say have you forgot this day of sanity? No problem the heavy key was thrown away as soon as the door was closed and locked you’re safe : some day the asylum may be torn down to make way for a palace of the mad it does not follow that anything will change : choose your executioner by lot almost everyone is trained and competent there are different schools of course check out degrees fees can become an issue of your choice and some may be in service or abroad as usual nothing’s simple it’s all a part of the grand unraveling that must take place before the new line can be introduced : prepare now don’t be shocked when the music starts the year’s fashions may feature pins and nails.
the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls are unbeautiful and have comfortable minds (also, with the church's protestant blessings daughters,unscented shapeless spirited) they believe in Christ and Longfellow, both dead, are invariably interested in so many things— at the present writing one still finds delighted fingers knitting for the is it Poles? perhaps. While permanent faces coyly bandy scandal of Mrs. N and Professor D .... the Cambridge ladies do not care, above Cambridge if sometimes in its box of sky lavender and cornerless, the moon rattles like a fragment of angry candy
Your friend has died, with whom You roamed the streets, At all hours, talking philosophy. So, today you went alone, Stopping often to change places With your imaginary companion, And argue back against yourself On the subject of appearances:
Departing summer hath assumed An aspect tenderly illumed, The gentlest look of spring; That calls from yonder leafy shade Unfaded, yet prepared to fade, A timely carolling.
When descends on the Atlantic The gigantic Storm-wind of the equinox, Landward in his wrath he scourges The toiling surges, Laden with seaweed from the rocks:
From Bermuda's reefs; from edges Of sunken ledges, In some far-off, bright Azore; From Bahama, and the dashing, Silver-flashing Surges of San Salvador;
There lies a vale in Ida, lovelier Than all the valleys of Ionian hills. The swimming vapour slopes athwart the glen, Puts forth an arm, and creeps from pine to pine, And loiters, slowly drawn. On either hand The lawns and meadow-ledges midway down Hang rich in flowers, and far below them roars The long brook falling thro' the clov'n ravine In cataract after cataract to the sea. Behind the valley topmost Gargarus Stands up and takes the morning: but in front The gorges, opening wide apart, reveal Troas and Ilion's column'd citadel, The crown of Troas.
As the morning advanced the sun became bright and warm, cloudless, calm, serene. About nine an appearance very unusual began to demand our attention—a shower of cobwebs falling from very elevated regions, & continuing, without any interruption, till the close of the day . . . There is a natural occurrence to be met with upon the highest part of our down in hot summer days, and that is a loud audible humming of bees in the air, though not one insect is to be seen . . . In a district so diversified as this, so full of hollow vales and hanging woods, it is no wonder that echoes should abound. Many we have discovered that return a tunable ring of bells, or the melody of birds; but we were still at a loss for a polysyllabical, articulate echo, till a young gentleman, who had parted from his company in a summer walk, and was calling after them, stumbled upon a very curious one in a spot where it might least be expected . . . We procured a cuckoo, and cutting open the breastbone and exposing the intestines to sight, found the crop lying as mentioned above. This stomach was large and round, and stuffed hard, like a pincushion, with food, which upon nice examination, we found to consist of various insects, such as small scarabs, spiders, and dragon-flies; the last of which, as they were just emerging out of the aurelia state, we have seen cuckoos catching on the wing. Among this farrago also were to be seen maggots, and many seeds, which belonged either to gooseberries, currants, cranberries, or some such fruit . . .
I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground. So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind: Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.
Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you. Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust. A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew, A formula, a phrase remains,—but the best is lost.
And before hell mouth; dry plain and two mountains; On the one mountain, a running form, and another In the turn of the hill; in hard steel The road like a slow screw’s thread, The angle almost imperceptible, so that the circuit seemed hardly to rise;
On my desk there is a stone with the word “Amen” on it, a triangular fragment of stone from a Jewish graveyard destroyed many generations ago. The other fragments, hundreds upon hundreds, were scattered helter-skelter, and a great yearning, a longing without end, fills them all: first name in search of family name, date of death seeks dead man’s birthplace, son’s name wishes to locate name of father, date of birth seeks reunion with soul
To Robert Lowell, Allen Ginsberg, James Dickey Were you guys lucky, too, to caddy, the light on freshly-sprinkled fairway delicate and bright as eye of an
God of lost souls, thou who are lost amongst the gods, hear me:
Gentle Destiny that watchest over us, mad, wandering spirits, hearme:
I dwell in the midst of a perfect race, I the most imperfect.
I, a human chaos, a nebula of confused elements, I move amongstfinished worlds—peoples of complete laws and pure order, whosethoughts are assorted, whose dreams are arranged, and whose visionsare enrolled and registered.
Their virtues, O God, are measured, their sins are weighed, andeven the countless things that pass in the dim twilight of neithersin nor virtue are recorded and catalogued.
Here days and night are divided into seasons of conduct and governedby rules of blameless accuracy.
To eat, to drink, to sleep, to cover one’s nudity, and then to beweary in due time.
To work, to play, to sing, to dance, and then to lie still whenthe clock strikes the hour.
To think thus, to feel thus much, and then to cease thinking andfeeling when a certain star rises above yonder horizon.
To rob a neighbour with a smile, to bestow gifts with a gracefulwave of the hand, to praise prudently, to blame cautiously, todestroy a sound with a word, to burn a body with a breath, and thento wash the hands when the day’s work is done.
To love according to an established order, to entertain one’s bestself in a preconceived manner, to worship the gods becomingly,to intrigue the devils artfully—and then to forget all as thoughmemory were dead.
To fancy with a motive, to contemplate with consideration, to behappy sweetly, to suffer nobly—and then to empty the cup so thattomorrow may fill it again.
All these things, O God, are conceived with forethought, born withdetermination, nursed with exactness, governed by rules, directedby reason, and then slain and buried after a prescribed method.And even their silent graves that lie within the human soul aremarked and numbered.
It is a perfect world, a world of consummate excellence, a world ofsupreme wonders, the ripest fruit in God’s garden, the master-thoughtof the universe.
But why should I be here, O God, I a green seed of unfulfilledpassion, a mad tempest that seeketh neither east nor west, abewildered fragment from a burnt planet?
Why am I here, O God of lost souls, thou who art lost amongst the gods?
My soul and I went to the great sea to bathe. And when we reached the shore, we went about looking for a hidden and lonely place.
But as we walked, we saw a man sitting on a grey rock taking pinches of salt from a bag and throwing them into the sea.
“This is the pessimist,” said my soul, “Let us leave this place. We cannot bathe here.”
We walked on until we reached an inlet. There we saw, standing on a white rock, a man holding a bejeweled box, from which he took sugar and threw it into the sea.
“And this is the optimist,” said my soul, “And he too must not see our naked bodies.”
Further on we walked. And on a beach we saw a man picking up dead fish and tenderly putting them back into the water.
“And we cannot bathe before him,” said my soul. “He is the humane philanthropist.”
The thing written is a sexual thing, may bite, tell a truth some have died for, even the most casual initialing is a touch of love and what love goes for. A sometime thing, it smiles or has an ugly grin, on the page or wall may be holy and a sin. Writing wants, must have, must know, is flesh, blood, and bone,
My friend they don't care if you're an individualist a leftist a rightist a shithead or a snake They will try to exploit you absorb you confine you disconnect you isolate you
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