Play the Piano Drunk Like a Percussion Instrument Until the Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit (10 page)

 

turmoil is the god

madness is the god

 

 

permanent living peace is

permanent living death.

 

 

agony can kill

or

agony can sustain life

but peace is always horrifying

peace is the worst thing

walking

talking

smiling,

seeming to be.

 

 

don’t forget the sidewalks

the whores,

betrayal,

the worm in the apple,

the bars, the jails,

the suicides of lovers.

 

 

here in America

we have assassinated a president and his brother,

another president has quit office.

 

 

people who believe in politics

are like people who believe in god:

they are sucking wind through bent

straws.

 

 

there is no god

there are no politics

there is no peace

there is no love

there is no control

there is no plan

 

 

stay away from god

remain disturbed

 

 

slide.

 

 

I like to prowl ordinary places

and taste the people—

from a distance.

I don’t want them too near

because that’s when attrition

starts.

but in supermarkets

laundromats

cafés

street corners

bus stops

eating places

drug stores

I can look at their bodies

and their faces

and their clothing—

watch the way they walk

or stand

or what they are doing.

I’m like an x-ray machine

I like them like that:

on view.

I imagine the best things

about them.

I imagine them brave and crazy

I imagine them beautiful.

 

 

I like to prowl the ordinary places.

I feel sorry for us all or glad for us

all

caught alive together

and awkward in that way.

 

 

there’s nothing better than the joke

of us

the seriousness of us

the dullness of us

buying stockings and carrots and gum

and magazines

buying birth control

candy

hair spray

and toilet paper.

 

 

we should build a great bonfire

we should congratulate ourselves on our

endurance

 

 

we stand in long lines

we walk about

we wait.

 

 

I like to prowl ordinary places

the people explain themselves to me

and I to them

 

 

a woman at 3:35 p.m.

weighing purple grapes on a scale

looking at that scale very

seriously

she is dressed in a simple green dress

with a pattern of white flowers

she takes the grapes

puts them carefully into a white paper

bag

 

 

that’s lightning enough

 

 

the generals and the doctors may kill us

but we have

won.

 

 

each night

well, almost every night

early in the evening

I see the old man

and his small black and white dog.

it’s dark on these streets

and no matter how often he has seen me

he always gives me

a look that is frightened

and yet bold—

bold because his small brittle dog is

with him.

he wears old clothing

a wrinkled cap

cotton gloves

large square-toed shoes.

we never speak.

he is my age but I feel younger.

I neither like nor dislike the man and his

dog.

I have never seen either of them

defecate but I know that they

must.

he and his dog give me a feeling of

peace.

they belong

like the street signs

the lawns

the yellow windows

the sidewalks

the sirens and the telephone

wires.

the driveways

the parked cars

the moon when there is a

moon.

 

 

a girlfriend came in

built me a bed

scrubbed and waxed the kitchen floor

scrubbed the walls

vacuumed

cleaned the toilet

the bathtub

scrubbed the bathroom floor

and cut my toenails and

my hair.

 

 

then

all on the same day

the plumber came and fixed the kitchen faucet

and the toilet

and the gas man fixed the heater

and the phone man fixed the phone.

now I sit here in all this perfection.

it is quiet.

I have broken off with all 3 of my girlfriends.

 

 

I felt better when everything was in

disorder.

it will take me some months to get back to

normal:

I can’t even find a roach to commune with.

 

 

I have lost my rhythm.

I can’t sleep.

I can’t eat.

 

 

I have been robbed of

my filth.

 

 

those lobsters

those 2 lobsters…

yes, those bastards there.

we’ll take them…

 

 

so pink-red.

 

 

they say if you put them

in warm water first

they’ll sleep

and when you boil them

they won’t feel it.

 

 

how can we know?

 

 

no matter the burning tanks outside

Stalingrad

no matter that Hitler was a

vegetarian

no matter that the house I was born in

is now a brothel

in Andernach

no matter that my Uncle Heinrich

aged 92 and living in that same town

dislikes my novels and short stories.

 

 

we’ll take those 2

bastards there

 

 

flowers of the sea
.

 

 

when you

first meet them their eyes

are all under-

standing; laughter abounds

like sand fleas. then, Jesus,

time tinkles on and

things leak. they

start making DEMANDS.

what they

demand is contrary to what-

ever you are, or could be.

strange is the

thought that they’ve never

read anything you’ve writ-

ten, not really read it at

all. or worse, if they have,

they’ve come to SAVE

you. which mainly means

making you like everybody

else. meanwhile they’ve sucked

you up and wound you tight

in a million webs, and

being something of a

feeling person you can’t

help but remember the

good parts or the parts

that
seemed
to be good.

 

 

you find yourself

alone again in your

bedroom grabbing your

guts and saying, o, shit

no, not again.

 

 

we should have known.

maybe we wanted cotton

candy luck. maybe we

believed. what trash.

we believed like dogs

believe.

 

 

sweating in the kitchen

trying to hit one out of here

56 years old

fear bounding up my arms

toenails much too long

growth on side of leg

 

 

the difference in the factories was

we all felt pain

together

 

 

the other night I went to see the

great soprano

she was still beautiful

still sensual

still in personal mourning

but she missed note after note

drunk

she murdered art

 

 

sweating in the kitchen

I don’t want to murder art

 

 

I should see the doctor and get that thing

cut off my leg

but I am a coward

I might scream and frighten a child

in the waiting room

 

 

I would like to fuck the great soprano

I’d like to weep in her hair

 

 

and there’s Lorca down in the road

eating Spanish bullets in the dust

the great soprano has never read my poems

but we both know how to murder art

drink and mourn

 

 

sweating in this kitchen

the formulas are gone

the best poet I ever knew is dead

the others write me letters

 

 

I tell them that I want to fuck

the great soprano

but they write back about other

things

useless things

dull things

vain things

 

 

I watch a fly land on my radio

 

 

he knows what it is

but he can’t talk to me

 

 

the soprano is dead.

 

 

in the awesome strumming of no

guitars

I can never get too high

 

 

in places where giraffes run like

hate

I can never get too lonely

 

 

in bars where celluloid bartenders

serve poisoned laughter

I can never get too drunk

 

 

at the bottom of mountains

where suicides flow into the streams

I smile better than the Mona Lisa

 

 

high lonely drunken grin of grief

I love you.

 

 

as the

spirit

wanes

the

form

appears.