Poems

Keefer Street

Sunday, January 25th, 1976

Hey, let’s go down to Chinatown
And get a bit of Lichee
You say that you’re allergic
And it makes your elbows itchy?
Well, that’s no serious problem
I know just what you should do:
Mash ginger root with ginseng root
And get a sticky goo
Mix it up with some rice vermicelli
That you’ve dipped in a little grass Jelly
Then rub it gently around on your belly
And wipe it off when it starts to go smelly.
Do this and your elbows will never get itchy
Though you’ve eaten your fill of delitchious lichee.

(Written for the Lund Theatre Troupe’s Production of Free to Be You and Me)

1973freetobe1.jpg

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December 29 1975 on the road, at the Foleys

Monday, December 29th, 1975

Voice of the sea
Whisper to me
Over and over and over.

Wave upon wave
Washing my cave
Clean and pure and free.

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June 12 1975

Thursday, June 12th, 1975

1.

Midpoint of our years
Summer Solstice nears
Mothers giving birth
Sanctifying earth.

2.

Dawn and Dusk converge
In the sun’s ovoidal path.
Opium days
Like poppy buds engorged,
Violet velvet vulvae
Swell, slit, split, splash out
Orange-red radiance
Petals, pistils, stamens
Fingers, toes.

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Riddle

Sunday, September 15th, 1974

In the mirror
I see me.
How can the subject
Object be?

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The Mill: A Winter Pastoral (25)

Saturday, March 4th, 1972

Tester’s Testament

This is the last time that I’ll sit
Slowly leafing through this log
Searching for a contact’s spark
To pierce my boredom’s lonely fog.

There’s hours when working in the mill
Seems like punishment for crime.
You’ve got a home and family
For that you’ve got to do your time.

It takes the strength of a serious man
To work on shift both day and night.
There’s character and dignity
In holding a job and doing it right.

But my time’s up, my Winter’s passed.
Though I hate to leave that steady pay
Spring’s lecherous tickling in my blood
Wont let me stay another day.

I take with me just a little money
But maybe more important still
I take a feeling of comradeship
With the men who remain and work at the Mill.

There isn’t much I can leave behind
As a legacy to share–
Just some contacts for a spark
To light the long nights in this chair.

pulpstudy.jpg

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The Mill: A Winter Pastoral (23)

Saturday, February 26th, 1972

Tarot Question

Shall I stay?
Shall I go?
Which will make
The spirit flow?
Do Graveyard’s skull
And bones disguise
God’s holy light
In bleary eyes?
If I remain
By my free will
Will Spring transform
This Wintry Mill?

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The Mill: A Winter Pastoral (15)

Monday, January 17th, 1972

Yew Street Basement

Here is a still life: the wheel thrown pot
Amidst the grids and graphs and charts
Scales and rule, calendar and clock
On the steel top desk in the pulp-test station.

There is still life in the centered cup
That holds the instant coffee I must drink
To keep apace the thrumming frequency
Of the sprawled electric death machine I serve.

There is still life in the ceramic mug
The elemental spirit of the hands
That mold with Nature’s art the water’s flow
The glaze of fire, the earthly body’s clay.

Still life
Soft frozen
In stone
With thumb
I feel.

4-12 shift

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The Mill: A Winter Pastoral (14)

Tuesday, January 11th, 1972

1

Your love is more than I deserve
Let me learn to treasure it
Without greed
Like the sinner loves his God
Who punishes
And cherishes his pain
Let me cherish pain
To purify my heart
That it may be transformed
Into a worthy sacrifice
To you.

2

Love me dirty, love me lewd
Keep your clothes on in the nude
Turn me inside out with lust
Send juices flowing through the crust
Of frazzled nerves and leathered skin
That locks my languished spirit in.

3

The worker’s goddess is his wife
The only meaning in his life.
To dignify his slavery
He raises her to high degree
Surrounds her with a million things
Home and kids and diamond rings.
When he’s about to lose his head
He remembers her in bed.
Lost his soul to please his Lord
Wielder of the mighty sword.

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The Mill: A Winter Pastoral (13)

Saturday, January 8th, 1972

January 8, 1972 graveyard shift

Winter Dance

The spirit flows freely when the vessels are cleansed by pain
The heart pours forth music from suffering it cannot contain
The pleasure we treasure when scratching the itch of desire
Can move us in circles but lacks the refinement of fire.

La da da da da, da da da da
La da da da da, da da da da

Love is our crime and our trial and our punishing scourge
We trespass our limits and violate time when we merge
That explosive fusion erases the rest of mankind
And when it is finished the vacuum leaves nothing behind.

La da da da da, da da da da
La da da da da, da da da da

The sins of the father are visited upon the son
And each generation will bury the preceding one
When Adam and Eve stole the apple from off the green tree
They crucified Jesus for all of eternity.

La da da da da, da da da da
La da da da da, da da da da

winterdance1.jpg

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The Mill: A Winter Pastoral (12)

Saturday, January 8th, 1972

January 8 1972, graveyard shift

Song

Pursued by a question
I found a closed book
That said on its cover
Don’t open and look.

Like Eve at the apple
I gazed a long time
While the serpent of doubt
Egged me on to the crime.

I spread forth the pages
I took the sweet bite
But the morsel turned bitter
As the words came to light.

I couldn’t stop reading
Despite the hot pain
In the slash those words burned
From my eye to my brain.

I love you, they screamed
To the man sent away,
It was just for the others
That I made my display.

But I know and you know
And they know it too
All trapped in a lie
We must live to be true.

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