I see, Larissa, thanks, and thanks again for posting such a powerful
sonic poem, its claws certainly aren't rachitic!
best
dave
2009/3/20 Larissa Shmailo <[log in to unmask]>:
> Yes, Dave, the intro to my poem pertains to the C.K. Williams poem. I heard
> and reviewed a 9/11 reading with Galway Kinnell and C.K. Williams back in
> 2001 and the poem evolved from there.
>
> Best,
> Larissa
>
>
> In a message dated 3/19/2009 5:40:15 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
> Golly, this has a punch, Larissa. Other than that CKW has a poem
> called 'War' is there more to the dedication? (a UK reader might not
> be aware)
>
> Best
>
> Dave
>
> 2009/3/18 Larissa Shmailo <[log in to unmask]>:
>>
>>
>> War
>> For C.K. Williams
>>
>> I.
>>
>> I reread the poetry of media-drunk scribes, absorbed,
>> as they are, with young girls gyrating and the need for status
>> even among orgiasts. How they claw,
>>
>> struggling for cabs, cars, and bars, and the nod from Cerberus
>> at the door of the club, as if from him, his elicited acceptance,
>> could come entrée to it all, the whole nine circles of desire.
>>
>> But Buddha was right, and it makes for lousy verse, the cascade
>> to the fallen from fulfilled. The rituals are old, and the same rachitic
>> claw
>> reaches over us all. And so, torn, we tear, primordial as the air.
>>
>> II.
>>
>> We live in parts. The rich ones know. Their eyes caress metals,
>> held tightly to the chest, played closely to the vest, thrown stingily
>> among the just-good-folks. You won’t find the address of their factories
>>
>> at hand. "We don’t know." An igniter built in Chappaqua,
>> a pull-pin glazed in Maine, in India a shell. We need arms, military
>> muscle, American dough. Watch it blow. Skeleton, step the crack,
>>
>> payback grenade, Jack in Iraq. Shrapnel tears, moist and red. There –
>> there (he was six) there – there (she has no hand) there – there
>> (his spine is torn) there-there (her head is gone).
>>
>> III
>>
>> A small time to be alive. A very small time to be alive, short enough
>> to pretend we’ve done no harm. Thanatos is a blind-man’s bluff,
>> an ignoramus with a stake, a what-were-we-thinking?, a mistake.
>>
>> How did we not know there was really no other? How could we, eyes,
>> mouths and heart, arms, legs, all the same,truly, same, how could
>> we see anything else but we? No fire or desire, just beloved all?
>>
>> Maybe as the last breath—will we know it as last?— as the last breath
>> goes, we---will we know any we? ---we might feel another’s dying breath
>> that we might know someone else’s as we know our own death.
>> Larissa Shmailo
>>
>>
>> **************Feeling the pinch at the grocery store? Make meals for
> Under
>> $10. (http://food.aol.com/frugal-feasts?ncid=emlcntusfood00000002)
>>
>
>
>
> --
> David Bircumshaw
> Website and A Chide's Alphabet http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/
> The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html
> Leicester Poetry Society: http://www.poetryleicester.co.uk
>
> **************Feeling the pinch at the grocery store? Make meals for Under
> $10. (http://food.aol.com/frugal-feasts?ncid=emlcntusfood00000002)
>
--
David Bircumshaw
Website and A Chide's Alphabet http://homepage.ntlworld.com/david.bircumshaw/
The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html
Leicester Poetry Society: http://www.poetryleicester.co.uk
|