ghosting //
corpus
so this is memory accounted full.
the one, the final word they wrote, to lay
a crying babe to sleep. a lullaby
to keep, against the fragmenting mirage —
a pile of rocks for angry men to stack,
to sit on. bone-built towers, against
the synthesizing might of desert hours
break first before the mother of the fast.
and these divisive scratches were daughters
of dust, heart-scriven on the dune. to say
my thirst was never for parted or past —
her caravan, sand-winding, ever-last.
//
on purity
for fallen letters, what shall be the frame?
by what peculiar law shall corpses meet
the living earth, form fitting for a shroud?
he wraps the feathered moon in milky white:
the linen law is hospitality
for questionable avatars of death.
the tide of peace is drawing known and un-
known sustenance. signals of opening
her laundered veil, returning as nearer
horizon frames the name; sustaining air
for flown word waxing into prayer; marriage
for metered heart — dark face for closer ground.
//
🌖
a pewter chest for the silver robes
already i have sensed murmurations of moving on. and i’ve hesitated. but it’s time to bundle these up in ribbons so that they might go home. ( what follows is an introduction to “silver robes of a rose rabbi”, a cycle of poems i will post on purnama, InsyaAllah. and the closing of a chapter. )
“telescopic texts” were born as serial replies to the twelve cantos of Wallace Stevens' “Le Monocle de Mon Oncle”. i stumbled into this project and was amazed at their unfolding, at the responsiveness of Stevens' text to this treatment, and at the fruitfulness of a dynamic interaction. furthermore, it became apparent this was exactly the initiation needed for this blog’s translation of Plato’s Phaedrus. ( things come together and open up in a wonderful way. )
“translation of the Phaedrus” — is “translation” the right word? for the sake of transparency: i’m not setting the rules; i am caught in a vast body of waves. flotsam is pulled in, cobbled together, sent away, before i have fully understood. this is embarrassing in all of the ways that “Mon Oncle” is embarrassed by its own sublime. ( by Love, as mantically bashful poetry, which opens into stratospheres. )
here, “Mon Oncle” has constituted an epicycle of Phaedrus. a poem is a gravitational pool to suck you in and spit you out as something ( or somewhere ) different. i go along for rides and things are created thereby. drunkenness is a confession, not a metaphor. it’s like losing everything, but then it’s the blues. InsyaAllah there will be more poems of insanity, madness, mania — the alchemical reduction to metered speech. ( pores of the poem, through which rivers flow back into the poet’s seed. and rivers will be the madness. )
but madness isn’t a method in itself, so i maintain that this is a translation. carrying bones is part of building a temple, even when the temple is something inconsequential like a blog. building a temple has from the beginning been the generative dream of this blog. ( a temple needs orientation toward Mecca, that stone among stones. )
a note on my process. in translating the text of Phaedrus, i had reached the end of a dialectical prelude. it was time to wrap something up, and time to get something started. there was an aperture into a dream. it demanded initiation. ( and/or it commanded leisure. ) Pindar was the first step, and a chariot was born, but i needed more contemporary tuning, more techniques, lenses, experience with my vernacular. ( i needed a voice; i dawdled at the crossroads. )
i was re-reading Wallace Stevens. his later poems captivated me when i was in college — especially “The Idea of Order at Key West” and “The World as Meditation”. moreover, they changed the way I read Homer. so they changed the way i read everything. ( before i ever imagined writing poetry myself. ) now i wanted to discover clues as to how Uncle Wallace had built his voice. so I was studying his earliest book of poetry, Harmonium, when i was pulled by the aforementioned gravitational force into “Le Monocle”. ( there occurred a fertility ritual; and a certain birth. )
so were created “silver robes of a rose rabbi”. i have seen and experienced so much in writing these — figuring them out, in, and around, being a poet of paltry months, with everything to learn. in case it doesn’t come across in the work itself: i have nothing but admiration and gratitude for Stevens' poetry. ( this has been an act of devotion.
and well, the text mistook itself for vestments. )
(
one final note. as i write this blog, i continue ( slowly ) to study the Quran. to speak of rivers flowing and gravitation — i have a “deep hunch” that the Quran is a poetic singularity. if so, then i’ll spend the remainder of my life ( slowly ) learning to read it. as i have spent up until now ( slowly ) learning to read. i do not understand this as being in conflict with my ( slowly ) translation of Phaedrus. so poetry ( slowly ) becomes a choir.
if a beginner voice, moreso a beginner listener. the first words of the Quran have begun to feel like sipping a trickle of fire out from underneath an immense ocean. for the sake of transparency. any light in these verses is from Allah through the intercession of the Messenger ﷺ. errors and mistakes are my own by the Mercy of Allah. Alhamdulillahirrabilalameen. Ar-Rahman Ar-Rahim. Wasalamu’alaikum to those i know and those i don’t know. Peace and thank you for reading🙏🏻
)
//
believing
and glass it was, the longing of vision.
for i have always needed you, she said
before the stone among the stones. and it
was true always, the howl that i was owling for.
or ever since it dawned on her how fine
the fiery threading of a needle, how
it blisters years with uncompostable weight,
the enemy one synthesized oneself to be.
to feel it as self-same brutality
from every spectral angel of your mystery.
the alchemy from suffering to face,
from poverty to panic, from the carelessness
of mirrored towers to a groundless refugee.
a fool, believing stones could learn to fly.
//
sly //
zero belongs to no man
i’ve heard of angels snaking down and up
the ladder of your lust, like cats on herbs.
smudged pawprints on faces of hierophant
or lovers or tower or devil or —
free spirit stumbles on the way, or trips
it upside-down, or stops to make a Friend.
a clock never belonged to her, the fool
is led by blooming tendrils of ylang ylang.
each word escapes the putri, playing prince
of winding wildernesses in beeswax.
tracing a comedy of errors, miss —
fit daughter of the whore of Babylon!
//
though it wandered, this poem was written in contemplation of a passage from Rumi:
There are true promises that make the heart grateful;
there are false promises, fraught with disquiet.
The promise of the noble is Sterling;
the promise of the unworthy breeds anguish of the soul.
(Masnavi I, 180; transl. Kabir Helminski)
//
proving ground
desire is a world of promises:
endings as sorry causes everywhere
i look. unkind is my outward explosion;
inward, it’s terribly bereft. while you
who are my second self, nimbly reflect
the shining order of my bronzen failure.
sightless, i touch your skin, and we are moved
by sterling promises of moonlit measure.
hunger stretches the bend along your limb
as multitudes, desiring one. believe
this melody. let melt the muscled heart
whose turning grief recovers ever Love.
//
nocturne
the veil was flowing flowering
like a breeze across the skin
warm as light, so you anointed us
with periodic rain
softened surfaces of fresh
and inner corners, feline lapsing
liquid weighted, frogs speaking
like guardian musicians
permeated the ending day
with silk, like incense curling
darknesses deepening pools
of sandalwood and agar
brick walls were tall and solid
the house was made of wood
tempered by burning beings
blending tongues for shadows
the flicker of shapes, familiar
arguments were unresolved,
touching was being touched
and sound of crescent, salivary
//
🌘
for the hidden wives
dog barks at the silence
dog barks at the noise
dog with gun or gavel
dog diploma, speculum
shadows feeding shadows
source of silent hum
(hum hum hum hum)
sending out a prayer
for the hidden wives
(of them them them)
//
otherworldly //
i’m not your brother
“i’m not your brother, and
i’m not your friend." Ozzy was never
anything but human, and unlike my father
he was never close enough to hurt me.
the only way to know is to endure.
the sound surrounds me / there is no direction
like my head is too big / and i’m listing listing
about the noise, if they scrape at the glass in the wind
an erosion of meaning, data like water / some source
of life, like an advertisement. always a celebration
pyramids of yellowcake. climb to the top and survey
your new kingdom, Ozymandias.
this is all well-trod territory, the subject
of many years of gnashing of teeth
from weepy traditionalists.
like rats in the nursery playground,
the algorithm executes perfectly.
a bunch of suitcases and random
flashlights depicting whatever hides
in the edges of this day’s blanket.
wait for me as I walk through this valley
in search of your grace, in search of the answers
i have been praying for. the way i said i wouldn’t
be biting it / ever again, i bit it anyway.
i was bitten hard, not by a dog but a man
in a white room / with a tall, angled ceiling
nerve-racking, plunging down the slanted
and enchanted earth, towards the abyssal / California sublime
full and heavy
it skulked low behind the trees / its pale light
an unset sun, a lot of potential
to pack into a broken vav.
//
Waalaikumsalam, selamat tilem, peace 🌑
incense of apples
rosy for harvest
the corn lifting her brow
woken to see, to please
interior pearls
of vegetal readying
silver to sunny yellow
the wind caught her silk
like paper, billowing husk
parched with radiance
cerulean burning
alive, by chattering birds
the reaper turning
against the blinding
day, a farmer is shaded
black bladed in gold
knowledge of dual-
lit flicker, the letting heart
the heartless taking
aroma of apples
as if autumn could visit
the island of gods
on rolling tropic
whiter sky and violet flight
they fall to the light
for all of the past
a year, the gravelling ground
a measured after
verdant and weeping
sweep the coconut trees, stray
air from everywhere
//
fungi in the filesystem
event: it needs
new categories.
local zoology lately
portends mycelial memes:
“camels” vs. “dissertations”.
monkeys on the roadside,
— laughing. un-officially, i
am giddy to be their fool.
follow-up: mushrooms
of animal entertainment,
best medicine?
antidote of day-
glow (glitch)!
//
red stone
here is where
greenway unwound
by time, by time.
here is where
salt, rust, corrosion
the wound word.
here is where
given untimely springs
sprung locket.
here is winding
roses and figures for
give, by vigil, by rest.
//
elusive //
deeper hospitality
a hedgehog digs down,
away from the wailing blight
of amplified multitudes
of lawnmowers and weed-
whackers, cutters of blades, root-
hackers and hoes of rows.
the damp earth dampens
all those. she wrinkles her nose,
raises reluctant eyelids.
a quiet guest
brings cookies, cozy with bitter
tea and conversation.
she eats the nuts,
leaves crumbs for ants,
an offering of grubs.
the world above
is too superficial, too high-
and-wired to fathom.
not much room, in the bright-
fraught world, for views
of under-ground.
close in her den, but not
too close, the good amount
of room for tidbitting.
cats' claws are sharper
always, in the ever-
wetter year.
the peanuts planted
in Pak Su’s field are swelling
bellies, growing round.
nibblers of words
become the reaping and
the kettle-ripening.
lower quills draw deep
as dirt-sighted sensitive,
burrows inky in-habiting.
//
🌒
dissertation on the dot
i am
with i
uneasy two.
unripened squeamish.
purple mumble-humble.
pretentious piXelated.
shallow faux-passé.
i know, but
there is a knowing
something in i,
that only ( you )
could be Other-
wise. i sigh.
i stroke your hair.
i watch you, sleeping.
i reach for you, i
follow your turn
by turn. i
admit
i am —
Obsessed!
//
telescopic texts (avec "?") (12/12)
now all of us have lost a taste for mince,
the history of grinding, darkly, Adam.
a schooling blade, student of buah, will prune
til circumspect the hour. and she has thorns,
forms of her own — we prick ourselves and bleed
to name her flower. bending the voice to crown,
we’re drunk by literal skies of melody.
you found her singing by the sea, where she
had fled, as she remembered you were drowning.
who is the rose rabbi? i read, she comes
and goes. knows herself not. how would she know?
if glass were introspect, Iris of time —
to find she had been borne, a cradled question.
//