sadness reigns, but poems can rain too

news flash: i did not get into the Master's Program in English with a Concentration in Film Studies, at NC State, despite some fantastic recs from some great duke profs. really bummed, but i'll live. for now, i am going to post an older, longer poem cuz i feel like putting something up here & this is the only good thing i've written in a LONG time. so here ya go, if you feel like it:

Motions of Return

"Wee haue divers curious Clocks; And other like Motions of Return. . . Wee haue also Houses of Deceits of the Senses, where we represent all manner of Feats of Juggling, False Apparitions, Impostures, and Illusions. . . . These are (my sonne) the Riches of Salomon's House."
                           
    --Francis Bacon, The New Atlantis

    I. Houses of Deceits of the Senses

as the pendulums undulate, the sight of its wave-like motions
often creates sickness.
the ululations only make the attendees nervous.
lines form, this-a way & that-a way, the periphery
delineated by an ever-changing center.

the word of his father is how one dictionary
exemplifies the word periphrastic; this is
not to paraphrase my father's word,
but to write my own, & call it mine,
so that i may say the phrase
mine-own -- a shakespearean turn,
with apologies for peripeteia.

so: this house, of diverse & curious clocks,
perennially reveals itself differently.
here, today, a Lyceum;
tomorrow a brothel. on friday
the slaves will be auctioned.
even the decor shifts, automatically;
the transmission is silent & pure.

each softly descending night, gear is packed up & stored away;
rocking & bending under the weight
we head for the attic.

tomorrow, in the early pre-dawn mists,
we will again repopulate this museum,
a motion of return, cylindrical
like a door-bolt, at once locked & accessible.

    II. Feats of Juggling

there was, at first, just a duality of spheres:
two balls, aloft with simultaneity.
over time, past the ticking of the clocks,
a trilogy was born. in fact, including appendages,
a sort of ennead could be seen, if only time were stopped
for a moment; muybridge would be proud.

now, there are kerchiefs floating,
chainsaws chaining, et cetera. the magician's
hand changes things over time.
this house of performance sells out,
seven nights a week.

the idea of metonymy is evidenced in sterne:
he abandoned the sword and the sex together
in other words: his military career
& his heterosexuality were abandoned.
& yet these are things to be returned to,
vocations create, in turn, revocations,
just as resolutions beget revolutions.

yesterday, in the early hours of evening,
we populated this arena,
circled in & out, eyeing the scaffold, angled
like a parabola, concurrently above & below.

    III. False Apparitions, Impostures, & Illusions

upon the screen above the stage float ghosts,
apparitions of appearances, snippets of conversation,
imposters posing as actors who are
'playing' their roles. we roll along,
suspending our unending will to disbelieve,
knowing that behind that cloth. . .

'do not look behind the cloth' we have been told,
& told again; we learned it from the wizard, the wizard of ounces,
who populated a chroma-saturated world,
greens greener than green, roads that were gold,
little men & larger women, with a city of emeralds;
yet still we're told:
'do not look behind the curtain'
so we do not.

as if we're in some cave, looking at shadows;
oh wait, did we learn that at the lyceum?
in this peripatetic wandering, we have come full circle;
the clocks have returned, our hands are full,
it is as if yesterday has become tomorrow,
like eternity stopped at the roadside for a conversation
with two beggars arguing over shoes.

yet this is all familiar, the stopping & starting of
time, the setting of sons; the rehearsal, when witnessed,
becomes the performance. the actors, act.
the viewers, view. & the clocks keep time, or not. . .
in any case, if these are the riches, the ones that we
heard about, if these are the riched, & this is the
house, & we get to stay: well,
imposture or no,

there's no place like home.

Comments

[Johnny Johnny Alias]

Hear ya got a brother named James, don't forget faces or names
Sunken cheeks and his blood is mixed
He looked straight into the sun and said revenge is mine

[Johnny Johnny Alias]

Hear ya got a brother named James, don't forget faces or names
Sunken cheeks and his blood is mixed
He looked straight into the sun and said revenge is mine

[David Cherryholmes]

Hey Mitch. A little late to the party, but just wanted to say that I enjoyed your poem. I'll keep an eye out for your stuff.

[Phil]

Ditto Joe. Bummer. I hope other great doors open for you.

[Joe]

Crap. Sorry.