I wrote much about N'Orleans back then (more from Grassblade Light):

 9


  
 Into the double-blind sea-swell
 of Venetian loam.  Hand-
 moving, in the clay – behind
 the stern wake, stunned, indivisible.

  
 Nine day's journey, Alma –
 out of the land of ye men, into
 a marryless land.  Through
 firewater, an anthole

  
 gauntlet lambada-limbo crouch
 (way backward) – a nine-
 moon labor pang.  Sign
 here, sailor, if you want to join – ouch!

  
 The pen tightens – doubles you
 up in one humus humvee – while
 you emulate a taut-unison chorale
 ascending in five-moth double Eu-

  
 bie Blake entwinements of the keys
 to a greenhouse kiss in a hexagon...
 where petals drift like snow – sun-
 dappled dogwood chariots, magnolias...

  
 magnanimous.  In May.
 And married like a jeweled bumblebee
 to their drifting, flowery labor, you will be
 saying Nein to the cyclopean neighing

  
 nay-saying Goliaths in your path,
 and Ja like J. of Ark did come one July,
 and rose steely, more than 0, tall Michael's
 scrimshaw – lifted on a lion's back (sans wrath).


      
                             5.16.99
 
 10


  
 So into a black milk-weave of blindness
 the light of a steady moth star steers you,
 ruddy penny – toward your amygdaloid's eye-
 opener errand road – your high so-phoenixness

  
 crying, I think icon, I think icon... – so fly,
 Sophie, benign little boatie! – and say
 Noah to chilled rains, aswim idly
 up to their yes in idolatries!

  
 Water's clear now – all the way
 to Rorrim the Clown's harbor
 borealis, and yon lil blue engineer
 that could climb the mountain.  Hey

  
 ey yo, Santa Griot – egg of Rio, G-dis-
 railer of the dragon – yo, milky, dizzy
 danglo-dangler – he done diz it, see?
 In yon marbled-arbor – muh herb, a Iz-

  
 reel... caa, caa, si?  Noah way, man!
 I stump ya yeti?  Caa-caa see Canonicus,
 son?  From diz angle?  Beak again!  Suss?
 Fly, lil snowflake – dew faster in sun!

  
 Ain't gonna herd you none, hear?
 Let him on go, Unc – red him his.
 For the load of the level church est
 right out of your chest, dovey dear –

  
 the ur-church worship – the chip-dip and
 swing-slippy can-do-U-can-you ca-new-new!
 Rainbowled over and rovered... a blue-
 red wing of humanbird-rainbearing El Atland!


      
                                5.16.99

 
 11
   i.m. Judge J.M. Wisdom

    
         "The criterion is the relevancy of color to a
         legitimate government purpose."
  
 America, the beautiful weaves of... grain
 upon grain.  In the eye of mountainous
 storms.  You, endebted dust.  Let's
 jam,  JM... ravin ravelin man.

  
 Made of Orleans jazz, yesterday –
 and tomorrow too, Bluejay - Ol'
 Man Wisdom – your birthday.
 Ol' brown muddy vacation, missus –

  
 weepy today – into the clay.
 Scythe cometh – while we blow
 these windy horns.  But you know,
 he done be beautiful.  That color-boy,

  
 he done it.  LA-forged rainbee affirmation.
 All-Franciscan cut-the-bull franchise.
 Out go the guardian ingenuous devices,
 the Donnelly-brooks – all the commotion

  
 of cantilevered cannot knots – he done it.
 Wisdom & Stone – that Jewish blood
 gone filtered through the 'hood.
 Delta land.  The swamp.  To-wit,

  
 to-woo... – soul river, Bluejay says.
 Where Blackstone reddened the blue-
 stockaded labored lawbook – where you
 read, down to the rushing streaming clays.

  
 Where Bluejay goes, JD – into Jerusalem.
 Washed along down the Mississippi, all
 my integral calculus.  A circuit of fifths.  Will
 be for you – these minor chords, my hummin hymn.

      
                             5.16.99