Public Writings

Public Writings

Him from Adam

you will see him in the subway
panhandling for change,
his only hope a penny
in his waxed paper cup
clamped between his sunken chest
and the stub that was his arm—
when?—before Vietnam?—
or picking up a cigarette butt
from the subway stairs,
and feeling lucky to find one untrampled,
putting it between contorted lips
like the lollipop from Santa
his big brother chewed up so fast—
there was only one to go around

behold the face of God

you will see her
stuffing a couple of pilfered Snickers
into her mouth smeared with pink crust,
leaving crumbs in the waxy lipstick
that she thought made her passable today,
reeking of scotch whiskey
she got away without paying for this morning
after a glitzy breakfast
of sweet cocaine

behold the lamb of God

you will see him drooling--
no mama no more to wipe it away--
and swaying like a daisy
drunk as a skunk--oops drunk again--
pissing in his pants
kicked out of the local hot spot
where no one would lend him a dime

tenderly, tenderly Jesus is calling

everyday scenes in New York,
New York, O higher power,
scenes as daily as a dose of methadone
administered with empty cheer

calling to you and to me

Listen All Round

far from the sea
you hold me
far from the land
and sky
over the road
you hail me
don’t lay down
you’ll die
a song
like those of yore
you’ll never
hear me sing
but when
my rhyming’s done
your meaning’s
hovering
you speak
as though
i hear you
you claim
to be alive
and only those
who doubt you
say they’re
the ones
who thrive
so sing a song
from heaven
don’t let me
bid you flee
but listen
to my morning song
and i’ll no doubt
hear thee
if this seems
old fashioned
i’ll bid you
tell me why
for living
is a puzzle
underneath
the sky
you know
my foreign armor
like one
covered with moss
that tree can clear
forever
like words within
a mosque
that tree
where Jesus
said to you
father
let them live
stands now
outside my mind
and yet still
deep within
your tongue
is made of
listening
far beyond today
and yet now is spoken
in only your way

A Story

a girl fell
following a love

fear nothing
spoke the cat

silence

Autumn Afternoon

yellow leaves
little paper thin suns
reminding me that tomorrow
may never come
the leaves
may never leave
their stems

A Friend Indeed

a Parisian vigil
i could not feel
in New York
at the time
a critical disjuncture

last night
you were baking
chocolate cupcakes:
to celebrate
someone’s birthday?

An Argument with Julius Green

Alone in my chamber
You speak to my mind.
Now that your life is over
Do you look behind?
You argue with power
But that’s not to say
You quarrel with me
When I lead the way.
You look for my writing
And what I’ll become.
A poet you’ll make me
Before your work is done.
So why are you angry
Whenever I rise
To my inner stature
Poetry-wise?
You tell me to kill myself.
You snicker with glee
When confusion overtakes me
And I obey thee.
But you are the one
Who committed suicide:
If you were to persuade me now
It would be homicide.
So ponder your own death.
I’ll wait for mine.
I’ll let God take me
In his own sweet time.

Regrets in the Making

wobbly ledge
rusty fulfillment
rusty pipe dreams
rusty love
love grown tired
exhaust
exhaust after anger

moaning dream
moaning, dreaming dreams
moaning for morning

where have you gone?
i don’t trust you

i know how you race past my pain
and your own
wheeling and dealing so fast, so slick

i know your type
i’ve read about you

you’re good at card tricks
good at poker
unlucky in love
(both of us)

i’m here
i observe you
racing past pain

are you high?

i walk on an awfully wobbly ledge
fulfillment is a wobbly ledge
a broken pipe dream
a rusty pipe i beat myself up with
our love is rusty too
left out in the wet too long

i’m tired of you
tired of your anger
that rusty pipe spews exhaust
you’re walking awfully fast
on that wobbly ledge

don’t fall now

i fall
even teetering
even so slow as i walk
i fall

now i’m falling in love with you
all over again

why do you go so damn fast?

you walk fast
you talk fast too

why so fast?
why so fast?

you make the present the past so fast

i’d have thought love would slow you down

A Viola’s Croon

October moons
Willy’s tunes
loony loons
lonely Junes

i want to walk soon

such are the means of my mind
so full are the words of my times
so matched is the lull in my lines

ajingle ajingle
a lover’s blonde tingle

nonsense nonsense
half a penny pence

amingle with your loving lyrics
the sweet moan of the moon
that lights your viola’s croon

A Stone, a Rock, or a Leaf

Turn over a stone
Turn over a rock
See squirmy bugs

Let me take your coat

Turn over a stone

Turn over a new leaf
Jolt your neighbors
Into disbelief

a nonpoem

your clear voice
keeps surprising me
clear, yes, but tender, too?

but you move me
through your body
not your voice

so spirits have bodies

they told me you had died, so human

but you tell me
you’re still alive
and still so human

and i can feel that
as surely as i felt your death
so ghastly

Tumbling

When I lose touch with you I lose touch with myself:
I go tumbling.

When I explain, fumbling, “I’m crazy” and then, “I mean my head is crazy”
You say, “But you’re not.”

I break into a sweat.
I open the kitchen window.
It’s cold outside, wintry, wet.
It feels like a chilly paradise.
It’s beautiful, quiet, and cold
As a cold washcloth
My mother placed over my eyes
After I’d come to her,
Finished with hot tears.

I say, “Look, it’s beautiful outside.
What a beautiful world.”
The rain pours down in cold relief.

I turn away from the window,
Slam it down and turn around.
And then I turn back.

I open the window again.

At the Gala

I am Locrinzia.
I have heard of God.
The paint rolls off the walls
In thin layers, in shiny pieces
Of yellow, orange, brown.
I stare at it as—
Oh, they are coming now,
I must stop and talk more later.
I am Locrinzia.
I have heard of God.

Now I must lie on my mattress
As the light dies.
They took me to that place
Where the bugs are set on your skin.
No one else was there this time.
They had heard me humming a hymn.
I have heard of Jesus.
And on my mattress as the light dies
I feel my self coming back to me.
They know I have a secret.
I will never tell it to them.
I have heard of God.
I can pray even with my hands tied to my back.
I don’t need to fold them like in the picture
I saw when I was little.

At the Gala,
There were glamorous people,
Looking forward to the Millenium,
When they would party again.
These people are rich,
Paying for dinner;
These people were laughing;
They seemed to know each other.
But on the walls were photographs,
And they caught my eye.
Pictures of nineteenth century
Mental institutions
Beautiful photographs
That tell us how far we have come.
But to me the striking thing
Was that no one was in
Those photographs. So we saw
What they saw, those institutionalized.
We saw the graveyard full of stones
With no names, only numbers
On the gravestones.
We saw the straitjacket
With no one in it, gesturing.
The eye of the camera
Became my eye, which became
The eyes of the souls in the institution.
We saw what they had seen
So long ago.

So I thought of Locrinzia,
Who named herself
When someone in the institution
Asked for her name.
No one named her until then.
Her mother left her there without a name:
How painful such neglect!
But sweet Locrinzia
Had a life within herself
Which made her different
From other children, others her age,
As she went through life.
And as a teenager
As she grew into a beautiful woman
She began to show her feelings.
And that is when the punishment began.

II.

I am Aquira,
Queen of the ward.
I will pierce you with my eyes.
I am power.
I make the light so light;
I make the sun so round and bright.
I am power.
I am Aquira,
Queen of the ward.

Doctor Moskos
Came in the other day,
Asking me for help.
Clean up the ward,
My queen Aquira.
Make it shine like the foil
Teeth you shine from your mouth
That makes your mug glow like sun.
So I cleaned and scrubbed
And he beat me down.
I am a mean mean woman.

I will get that man someday--
That weasel.
I will blow his brains out!
Now, I do not have a gun.
Ain’t no guns on the ward.
But I have a mind.
My mind is power.
I have a mind.
It shoots thoughts like bullets.
Look out, Doctor Moskos:
Lie low like pulp…

I am Suzylou.
I got a body
Like you wouldn’t believe--
Intricacies like they warn you about
On your road signs in Westchester.
I burn with various bodily hungers
Underneath this flimsy rayon gown.
Look out Doc Azure.
I notice those eyes
Trailing over my breasts--
Hankering eyes
Like dying worms.
Close them tight
When you love your Mama--

I am Bernice,
Slinger of hash.
I feed my friends here.
They are women
Not trash.
Your tummy is sagging;
Your diet is why.
Now eat my good Doctor,
But don’t tell me where.
I know they serve snails
And cucumbers there--
No potatoes, canned meat, or juicy fry.
Here we are women
Whose food makes us smile,
But not like you do
As you heave your sigh
For your Daddy who loves you
Or is that a lie?

I am Wendy,
The laundry lady.
Write that down,
But put my secret foremost:
I am Wendy and Windy:
There are two of me.
One of me is humdrum,
The other has pizzazz.
Forgetting I am Wendy,
As I smooth the sheets I fold,
Smooth them, smooth them,
I dream of Windy,
Getting cornrows done,
Giving lectures on Slave Girls,
Remembering Harriet Tubman,
Drinking Harvey’s Bristol Crème,
Prancing down Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard,
Graceful as a ghost,
Unencumbered by a body.
Yanking on the sheets,
Like arms, snarling arms,
Weak and white like honky arms,
Twisted too like honky minds,
Yanking them out of a genuine front loader,
My glasses get steamed up,
Covered over white like
Windy’s frosty mug of Colt 45.
Now Windy she’s got two pairs of contact lenses,
In sapphire and emerald green—

III.

We have heard of God.
We have heard of Jesus.

You must admit
There’s been some mistake.

Admit it:
You belong here
As much as we do.

It can’t be so bad, can it?

So pray to your Jesus.
Pray to your God.

Tell your secrets to them.

Or find a good doctor.

Otherwise, someday,
Those stories of yours
Just might land you, too,
In the psyche wards of forever--
The place where we all belong.

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