Hats of Smoke

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Oxen of the Sun 418

blind digging at the road to the heart
where else would I find a password?
a hair's difference between love and debt
here, at most, we deliver eyes.
shaking wires we spit anchors
most stunned in pairs exquisite we
boil our wants down to shining twigs
and use them to set fire to our stain
if we only had wings
war would be only a name
these little children
would be shamed into waiting.

Wardream

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Oxen of the Sun 417

with a drunken gun
this madness stands gone along the
beautiful night
like art it fires tramps and bishops
savvy cabbies and Irish bibles
shades, tramplers of meaning
mounted one on the other
sweetsweet bonnyclabber, fiddler
enemy of morning
business of yours
kicking ministers and
watching the clock
bleeding on counters
and passing away on prairies
reviving to the thunder of numbers
nearing the last world
sleeping in our boots
advancing on obligation, awful time
we spend our days designing all this madness.

How Ghosts Fill the Space of Memory

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Oxen of the Sun 416

The possibility of remarkablest innocence
is language without air
rain makes truce but pandemonium follows
what is enlarged by labor is made sorely
human-it
tells of a cracked world- the years of floating
the slaughter of rocks
making music of envy
heaven, heaven, you forgive the gall and starshine and
I will tell you a story of veins and bleeding
of waiting in empty rooms for the completion of
fragile deeds but
this all ends in watching
astounding fruit falling,
wonderful, truer than kindness
happier than an ascending bird
breathe into me a celestial art
tell me a story of America,
Tell me a story of home

In This Land, Even the Rocks Can Speak

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Oxen of the Sun 415

Don't dare remember that this is a game
the remote look of giving
smiling, perhaps these storms are
only angels
ardent
dangerous
fond of hands
transfiguring shadows over the world
while we slumber wide-eyed
under the torrent of light below
and you are over there,
standing with an urn of ashes
too conscious of some last full grey birth
where were assembled the
shepherds, the girls
who were arrested then bled until
they resembled the comedy of skin
collided punctual with the end
and were finally mistaken for the vast sky.

He Has Vastness On His Side

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Oxen of the Sun 414

hopeful sin faithful him he waits
suffering
his own embittered calm
let the light grow dim
well done, now, your ashes
shine in my heart, heart of silver-
rememberancer of our own good time
we abide in all sorts of smooth persuasion
breaking from cool, oh famous africa
upon these words deliver staggering pleasure
your face at midnight, tranquil amid this sorry rain
timbrel-like on the roof of your vision
your part so loyally played
a scene so disengaged from memory
a scene so disengaged immediate space
the evening well-remembered
knows the heroes of the morning world.

The King In Flight

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Oxen of the Sun 413

reclining in hunger
unascertained husband as yet
passed on in longing
as yet to give life
like a poisoned cat staggering
from years to days good gone
before flowerless but brave
happy bloom
happy eyes
happy complicated breathing
telling us to be proud
older times tales
told
delivered in beautiful voice she
who happy of the weary fight
as yet to take her place
as yet to smile
to share the baby's
flesh and whirligig
to find enlightenment in the slaughterhouse
as yet to gaze on a faithful master
as yet to shake awake a prayer of happy times.

The Distance of Liberty

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Oxen of the Sun 412

The germ of Ulysses is the beautiful sun
of Daedalus, unaccountably perfect nevertheless
the reasons for this labor
are the reasons of nature:
the tides of blood
the lunar movement
the law of pain.
we may rest assured that
death yet staggers around with us
we the ordinary children
of perfect intention
the disgusted flowers
of productive digestion
thinking of neglect
dreaming of infanticide
we throw our human interruption to
the practice of manners
to the race of science
to the ordinary relief of everything in general and
nothing in particular.

Gelflugelte Worte

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Oxen of the Sun 411

All Graces are alleged
our complaints hover over the streets
over the dust we embrace
inhaling happiness and acceptance
our mortality is interesting because it cannot be answered
we are born animals of hideous intervention
we are accountable to our devices
we are genuinely good at light
and bad at the future
our science limited to images of complaint
we allow spectacles to pass in the streets
without prophesy
without sound
our problems are suspended in neglected statues
we are moved to repeat phenomena
we are music
silent, peculiar
blinking, we prove the existence of the sun.

A Tattered Clown

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Oxen of the Sun 410

considerable eyes leave and
eventually turn to dust
however, the course of life
is a calculation, an
accommodation to the heart
when our labors sit soiled
and all eventuality is debated before
the wisdom of depravity
by keen debaters bearing
fake stigmata and inquiring to the heart of life.
And we are they, who involuntary,
sought the hole into which
we should pour our vacant elegance
and be here, in constancy.
we are made with innocence,
according to our days;
these days.

Kharma Gate

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Oxen of the Sun 409

what has happened is a matter of gates
what is happening is the chain of hands
passing illness from week to week
passing stones through troubled organs
waking to find ourselves constellations
of misconception
symptoms of silence
carried on mirrors
feigning disorder
but, assuming luck, we look at the moon with second thoughts
the gods are kind
we are awakened by our visions.

Stone River Ghost

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Oxen of the Sun 408

Where are all our recent ghosts now?
an ancient desire on a stone
cooked fine with mercy and loneliness
beating out a lover's name on a skin of
life, a torn winner glad of his victory
remembering only today.
How impossible it is to be
reminded of our genius water
while pissing in this river
we cross on dark horses
we are close to home
how can we contain all this air?
our names become promises of
noisy failure- our flag is fallen and
easily mistaken for yesterday.
We wish we had left something more.

A Word That Makes Thinking Strange

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Oxen of the Sun 407

At dusk she is reminded
Onward silently toward her phantoms
Onward to the moaning clouds
She, of high magnitude
Of lesser land
Wasted, trumpeted twilight
Behind the voice of infinite space
Behind the bright mysterious wind
Within the structure of these ghosts
Within the rebellion of heaven
Given over to something growing
To a sign of magnified stars
Onward on this highway toward the lost,
radiant stream of years the
salty flesh veiled in gold the
skies of heaven moving around the sun.

Do you know of the prophecies of lightning?