This section of Stubborn was written in 1998. Henry & his "spirit buddy" Bluejay are sitting in the backyard behind Shakespeare's Head, a historic building in Providence.

5

There was silence in the starlit backyard.
Far below the spine of the ridge, the bawling
of worn-out Rovers, Jeep Harpooneers, trawling
the iron highway. The white noise of the herd.

The moon shed a parched light, through the beech
trees and the maples, down onto Bluejay's arm.
Henry squinted. Images began to form
before his eyes or in the back of his head - each

indentation whorling, interlacing, a curlicue
of narrow formations, a lake of clay-coated
muscle-shored black sailor's pearl-moted talki-
talkitalki cueduetlicueduetli dumbshowlodrumsolo

strung minarets. The red tongue silent,
the palms aswaying, the stars askew.
Henry stared down tattoo avenue, until
the whole of Shakespeare's backyard bent

into a dusty parallax (black, white, gray).
Sudden - Olympian thunder rent the airwaves.
A missing Tailcat lunged into the grooves
of ice - Witch Country swells the day -

Dust Bowl football suddenly Game to Play!
Smart missiles artifically enhanced
for endless penetration danced
toward Dad's golf bags - hip houris

scuttled for shelter (squired under the square
air-raid shelters screwed shut by sultry sheiks)
just in time before the pool cue speared the steaks
- and I ran (unfertile myself) into the queer

crescent, deserted by storm, rapped on the head
by a load of unbending luscious Grecian pillars
ironed by a missing Nelson in Trafalgar's
wasteland (protected by a titanium toolshed).