Wednesday, August 05, 2009

Room 34443.01


it would be a mistake not to rise early to break fast and to walk within the city or in the great Earth to go forth into the sounds the huge day and the curses and the voices and the clouds and the women and the men of all ilk or being; to rise and go; and maybe first the fried liver the bran the oat the milk the nuts the tea the coffee the aqua; and to set out like a small god or a thing; anything huge or small; anything of dirt or light or being, any possibility; it, not to go, a terrible waste of the sky and the lungs and the light and the motor cars, the gardens, and the old man by the bus stop or the cat the fly the air the your the you of me or the lungs the heart the legs; to go and not to miss; for there is the no final Yes infinite in meaning or sound or the wind and the sweet girl sweet flower sweet songs; and the harsh menace the secret and the rocks to avoid; but it would be error to lie abed silly head for the brain is your brain and it is your hand, for the Now shall hold it in clasp and the menace of eyes / the yes of eyes / and the no of eyes / and the No of those who fear or who do not fear to embrace the tumult of the shout and the words and the works the days; it would be wicked to lie or yet to die for we and me and your and you could venture the bran the honey the bitter death the blood the sirens the sure soft sucks the dangerous scents; and the all bright ambiguous yield of the queer beginning of sound and the perfect imperfection of day and eye the pain; the crave the hunger the swirl and the great sea the child the things the road and it all; stepping out in the city or the world the dark dust the what is next; for out of the enigma of ending and the surety of starting out and the manifest of cessation of the uncertain step as the egg holds vital the Nothing where things begin or die; but the dappling splashing light is now russet now green and now it is a cascade of man-killing ice and now the fire spreads beyond anything your mind could imagine or your ear could hear; or the clack of stones and the miasmic mesmer of the especial silence; and colours imply the plunge into the sea or the tramp of mighty boots or the quiet scratching of a match to start or stop; and yet we breathe we breathe we breathe in all tortures of joy – for there is no truth whose lie we cannot ache for in our huge aloneness; and the girl and the man or the woman or the child or any being or thing that is or imagines or images or is the dust of the potential ghost or the sign or the song or the music of create who would search; endless endless the stopping start who it wakes us and it lurches and they sup in expectation of the thing shall come; a fire in any being’s eye; the eye of all things the beating things or the soft thud in the dull sad hope as rouge and grass and the things moving always and always but never still as the grey light and the whiteness spreads and the white and the breast the muscle the stare the dog the limping man and the dripping tap the beat the great gush and the storm begin the sad wind and the huge joy of the child the heavy boot the thud the grief and the wing and the sting of song and the strange of truth and the knot and the seed in soil; the minute and the uncountable the stars the milk the flow beyond all moons the Cow of knowing the ignorance in the great library of towers where the nodding smile is a book on a beach of dreams is the truck and the blood of the what of all things are beyond all arks or shelves and the sea and the songs and the many musicks and the capering antics of ancient Man…

…. and the eternal lust of Woman and the power the power the power and the all generative regenerative mighty Deathlife ka’ora of the Two


6 comments:

Amanda Joy said...

Richard, This is fantastic!

I believe cyberspace may have devoured my reply to your note.. I shall try again...

love
Amanda

Richard said...

Amanda - thank you - I don't seem to get or receive emails from you - oh well..

This poem was inspired when I was reading (again the early part of Ulysses by Joyce, also a poem by Herrick about urging his girl to get up and taste the day (life) and so on...

I was wondering if it was all bit much - a bit over wordy though...

Forgive me if I don't read so much on line of your own work; I get tired looking at screens - I really need to get new glasses but I cant afford them just now - I lost my other ones..

But I will have good look at your Blog when I can soon..

I'll check something else to see a possible reason your emails aren't getting through

Keep well!

Amanda Joy said...

I love the collisions and shortcuts that jostle all through the density of words.. its "over wordy"-ness.

I've been online very little too of late, but hatching something new in here soon. I know what you mean though.. screens are exhausting.. and yet so fascinating.

I've just finished reading John Barnes' essay Goethe, The Power of Rhythm which was a beautifully written meditation and lots of bits and pieces of Baudrillard. I also finally stumbled on some Sam Hunt in a second hand bookshop here.

Richard said...

Thanks Amanda - I intend to copy that and read it at the next Auckland Poetry Live.

I haven't read much of Goethe although I have various of his books.

I'm surrounded by books - my own and have a kind of horror that I wont be able to read enough of them before I leave this mortal coil!

I love essays like that about writers..."Minotaur by Tom Paulin is very good. The Wound and the Bow and Axel's Castle (I just realised after googling that I also read To The Finland Station in 1969) Helen Vendler & Marjorie Perloff (in quite different but =lly valid ways); another book useful is "Odd Jobs" by John Updike - I haven't always read all the essays in these books but they are good to dip into...

Is that John Barnes or Julian Barnes? Eliot Weinberger is also fascinating and as a writer I stumbled on W G Sebald who has some similarity to NZ's martin Edmond who is in Australia and writes brilliantly. here - Michelle Leggott and Jen Crawford write fascinating stuff...but earlier writers are Baxter, Curnow and Smithyman who we Titus people consider to be the greatest writer - well the greatest writer possibly of poetry in the middle part of the 20th Century anywhere! So Scott Hamilton wants to start a discussion group on his large book Te Atua Wera (The Fiery God)...

Of all these claims to greatness are relative and based on personal taste! Sam Hunt was legendary as a kind of traveling minstrel (I went to one of his readings and he was good) or a bard...influenced by Baxter who at his best is also great...

Hope you are doing well - be great if you can make it here

I'm in Panmure Auckland so easy to find my ph number and address so write or phone me when you get here or before email me whatever...

Anonymous said...

Richard - this person has been claiming that you support his shady agenda:
http://readingthemaps.blogspot.com/2009/08/against-space-and-time-crostopi.html

Youre not part of this CROSTOPI thing are you?

Richard said...

I may well join CROSTOPI but I need to ponder this matter deeply...