through Narragansett smokehole

AGATE LAMP

A peaceful evening in late April

the trees barely budding

in mild light   while brooding

darkness rings   the besieged people

& this dissonance of visible   invisible

an indivisible fire   smoldering

criminals & saints   revealing

callous inhumanity    with humble

solidarity   courageous   all-compassionate

& in my flimsy gazebo

octagonal coracle or   Argo

with Sophie’s wind-chime   over the gate

delicate oak-leaf butter-knife design

tingling in the calm air   O

here in my Ariadne-lair   where

a Chartres J coils  toward her Eschaton

& my whisper follows Cautantowwit

through Narragansett smokehole 

southwest, southwest   while a soul-

hart sails back   to her monarch nest –

that circling square dance of Ocean beams

where the spirit of Jessie Ophelia

& Juliet Ravlin   abide in Thee   &

Eternity, O Eternity! cries Roger Williams

& you lift your agate lamp, Psyche

like a fiddlehead   in Holy-Land

& the soeur-coulombe of the Son

of Man   swerves   with a shining eye

4.27.20

beehive hop melds drones

SCRAMBLED EGGS

October in my spindly cedar octagon.

Oblomov in a quaint gazebo

waiting for his Olga, O.

Henry had an MRI today.  Beat.  Ochin.

His mini-RI, his Ocean State,

full of scrambled eggs &

mussels, canonical sand...

some Narragansett raving (will abate).

He can’t lift Juliet (or JB, either)

out of the bitter surf

with a pompous word, a mere

sniff to the wise.  Just take a breather,

Hen.  The heart is a mystery

who can plummet?  Purple

majesty amid all people,

8-ball in the Rabbi Shabbat sea –

where be wisdom be to found, Henri?

In love again with Heidi

or whole neighborhood, ey?

In Mendelssohn, where the bee-

hive hop melds drones to symphony...

where children laugh naturally

& Sophie will skip-to-me-

Lou through the live-oak gateway

immemorial... as toward you, gentes,

Jeannie, Juliet, Jonah,

the heartbeat (Shekinah)

skims near – overshadowy Benny Voluntas.

10.9.19

unusual poem

OLMEC TEETH

Providence, a meeting-house of rivers.

Moshassuck, Woonasquatucket...

Narragansett alphabet.

Key into the Language (Roger’s

hopeful idiom).  Green valley space

for some invisible Seeker-

church – plain Shaker

chair for Eli, or Henry (grace

supplementing human nature

like a mild blessing

before Thanksgiving).

Can we do this, Roger?  Sure.

Providence, a circling campfire

of Renaissance persons.

Like a Rembrandt summons

to be humble (as St. Matthew’s ear

to voice of dark-haired angel).

Listen, proud Ferrara –

not to glose of Schifanoia,

but shade-garden of Bassani-spell.

The meekness of a soft goldfinch

will be memorial

for what was already eternal,

always.  As our Redemption is a cinch

for flighty heartbeat (underneath

the chain-link).  Grail-canoe

or eye-in-hand – you

fled into thin air, through Olmec teeth.

5.6.19

inside the coracle

UNBENDING PINE

You hear the rustle of a spring

in the moss forest;

in the immaculate nest

inside the coracle.  Outside, nothing.

Milton tutored Williams in Italian;

Roger taught John a mite

of basic Narragansett

collecting firewood around London

to banish winter at the poorhouse.

Here in January ice

beside the river, ICE

is on my mind.  The Emperor’s

in league with Herod, every infant

trembles for her life;

Virgo is mummified by strife;

grieving, she murmurs her dissent

from frozen exile on external heights.

Meanwhile sweet Providence

searches for evidence

& Lincoln coins... irrevocable rights.

Your imago, moss copper-serpentine

(between Son of Man

& some unbending pine

of immeasurable heaven) is Washington

redeemed, again; your Virgo (hovering

ethereal triangle

o’er Spotsylvania) might mingle

with Virginia clay... Jonah, recovering.

1.18.19

leaves of shades

ALMOND PROW

Snow was gentle over Rhode Island

on the birthday of MLK.

It fell on tenement & highway

& on the gravestones (Irish & Italian)

near Mashapaug – where Narragansetts

warmed by winter fires

sang for their ancestors.

Henry remembered how sun sets

there, flaming the cauldron west of town –

suffusing with rich violet light

(flower of Ocean State)

seven hardscrabble hills.  Raven has flown.

Memory like a lonesome sepulcher

is quiet as the dust.

His loves (merged in one ghost

dance) circle Blackstone’s Catholic Oak.

& he walks by dark brooding Mississippi

through brown scrub

like Hobo in an empty tub,

or Orpheus without his head – see

the Maenads turn to friendly tadpoles

wriggling alongside, as

he wails downstream?  Alas!

High in his Ravenna dome, haloes

of milky starlight crown a shepherd’s brow.

Mosaic over Memphis

(or Atlanta)... Isis

enthroned, or Miriam?  Jonah’s almond prow.

1.15.19

a merry caw-caw for Thanksgiving

GIVE THANKS

We give thanks for life’s poetry

which arrives (unexpected)

through gates of neglected

farmyards.  For the spare mystery

of solitary lighthouses, beaming

steady wheel-spokes

(Rhode Island folks

know what we say, dreaming

sea-woven Narragansett night).

A merry caw-caw

semaphores her law

by roof-smoke... Raven’s last rite;

like Roy Van Doublegram – cross-eyed

matryoshka doll

(owl in a well) –

Hagia Sophia’s multiocular Argo-hide

(serpentine tesserae’s bronze

glint, like Quetzalcoatl

drifting up from Mexico).

For being lifted up to heaven’s

dome, by way of Providence

(O supernatural Grace).

Who is that Falcon-Ace

on Ibis-wing, speeding to silence?

Emily, Cordelia... be

with me now.  Will

must climb volcano-hill...

Love’s Istanbul (Turkey).

11.20.18

on Veterans' Day

OLD CANOE

They walked on the beach on Veterans’ Day,

Henry & Alex, 11-

11. Father & son. 

A peaceful drone from the Pacific, hey

ey yo.  Henry, oh Henry, what

have you done?  Broken

the lawful bonds of Christen-

dom.  Limps toward Yehoshephat,

your son, your son (beneath milky

ocean spray).  Laborious

struggle to restore justice...

the father’s crimes his legacy.

Innocence precedes the chaste

memorials of same;

children entering the game

adore that grass, to which they haste.

Endicott ripped the Cross out of

the Union, Jack – inspired

by Rog Wms (hired

Ajax?).  Puritanical ab ovum

back in Topsfield (prior Zaccheus

Gould).  Desecrations

rule the day.  Someone’s

idea of revenge, rebellion... us?

The Narragansetts have a word

for youthful arrogance

(I forget).  Once

Henry walked another beach (Rhode

                     *

Island) lugging remorse (mule, dunce).

The heavy waves pounded.

Ocean-soul sounded.

Cordelia’s quipu-crown (silence).

The madness works itself out (&

might end, someday) –

the greedy Boar will slay

& slay, until his tiny orange hand

is stayed.  Complacent cows of Bashan

wallow on the slopes

of Washington (one hopes

Starbucks will runneth over, son)

until berserkers finish slaughtering

(but that was in another

coffeeshop – it wasn’t her).

Columbia keens for her offspring

in Ramada Inn, who are no more.

Henry Oakillas, huffy

Henry, O... what now?  I

do not know.  To the bridge?  Claymore?

More clay?  Sword shall pierce

your own soul, Mary.

The air, soft here – sea-

air (light of a sweet lightness).

The chaste beginnings of Thanksgiving

in the myth, in the dream...

on the shore, by beam

of some old canoe.  Hoping, hoping.

11.12.18

a place in your mind

SOMEWHERE OUTSIDE

Providence is a place in your mind.

And also a town.  Like

the sun rising over the lake

be burnished benevolence – &

also a solar systemic fact,

dawn’s chilly weather.

& if we dream together

rather than apart... the intellect

somewhere outside the movement of

these moons, planets...

Now what you grinning at?

You wilna guarantee supernatural Love?

But I am what I am, & I am, I am

a wondrous thing (after

10 a.m.). O ye rafters,

rise!  O ye gates of Jerusalem!

Providence, funky old town.

With a history.  Roger,

under killing weather

in a warm wigwam.  The plan

for the planets, the calm creation...

like a vase whirled in milk,

a home for Black Elk –

at the door of six directions,

where the sheepfold meets the sea.

A little oaken Okean.

A microcosm, spinning,

Jen.  Dream, le songe, where you meet me.

10.26.18

after looking at Joan Mitchell paintings

SIMPLE BUBBLE

The battle for the blank white page.

To start anew, Joan.

Pale-bright field of corn

shaded by grey to black paint.  Rage?

Minnesota summer wheat

outside New Ulm.

Bohemian hum

of Anton Gàg?  Felt like defeat

for everyone.  Hungry Dakotas,

heimlich Bavarians...

local George Washingtons

banked on cheap lots (take theirs).

Everybody trying to shill Big George

back in redcoat London.

Not to be outdone,

Tidewater gents – that’s our land, by George!

Learn some Narragansett, maybe.

Milton did – from Roger,

one hot frozen winter.

To love, not to betray, your neighbor?

Somebody tell me how to get from here

to there, America.

Too used to being honcho

number one?  Come to shore;

wash in water.  À bas.  Restore.

The level’s golden measure,

simple bubble of air...

sea’s middle C, beyond all war.

10.13.18

the ordinary Union

KNIT WOOL

                 Eternity, O Eternity! That is our business.

                                                       – Roger Williams

She watches crows play in the sky

above her balcony.

Her dregs of memory

transmute to gaiety, give death the lie.

Cautantowwit was Raven-Lord

of Narragansetts.  Old

Canonicus told

Roger how dead souls were borne toward

Mexico, far off southwest...

Rog quilled it down.

That chief of great renown

was kind to him.  Knit wool is best

around head, limbs & heart

when winter ice descends.

I’m dreaming, friends.

One campfire (circling) is all my art.

The Red Wing river-clay is heavy,

as my mother knows.

O the harsh blows

that fall like thunder (Romeo, Julie)...

The body’s weight is catenary

Golden Gate (so

Jasper shows).  Blow,

Manitou... bring back the glory

of the ordinary Union.  It shall be

– when we return to Thee,

from sea to shining sea –

uncommon good (benevolent Eternity).

11.29.17

What cheer, Netop?

WESTERN STAR

Words gather round you, little tree

of Providence – little pine

of memory, blue-green

as the sea.  An Itasca task for me,

to reckon the source of poetry –

freshwater Ocean State

from a spring so shy, so late!

– in the heart of Hobo’s Mississippi.

Like a calm symmetry between

twin Mirror Lakes... maize

mazes, where she stakes

me down (tied at the bow to green

apple root)... under the granite gate

at Prospect Terrace – Roger’s

benevolent dream-sponge,

soaking up querulous fear & hate

& wringing them out upon a font

of Narragansett friendship.

What cheer, Netop?

hails the raven-tested testament

of human fellowship – fond canoe

of rational amphibian,

this turtledove Leviathan

who swallows all to bear Jonah anew.

Buoyant almond of my soul... you are

that copper-penny Liberty

harboring everyone for free –

between Caesar & God, one Western Star.

9.8.17

hobo takes upward path

ITASCA SPRINGS

This deep translucent honeycomb,

this palimpsest of green

beside the bronze serpent

of midmost river, mother-stream.

Hobo must climb from his log-bed

of lassitude & diffidence.

He sees the circumference

of his enormous creaking sad

forsaken solitary double

ferris wheel – his rusted

rose or Island Road,

a lonely spark of conscience-trouble

(ancient Roger Williams port

for Puritan & exiled

Quaker, reconciled

by Narragansett welcome-heart).

He must un-knot his mumbling

& speak to the res publica.

Tender Mnemosyne

leans like a wispy cedar, trembling

against the scorpion-twister

of learned viciousness

& bland unconsciousness –

conceited treason like a blister-

burn, compound of avarice

& vanity – unreason

squawking each lesson

through megaphones of fraudulence

                  *

– corpse-flowers of corruption

breeding in rotten logs

of oligarchy – hogs

& coyotes preying on the children

of the designated sacrifice

(the under-underclass

under the overpass,

who pay for our convenience – twice).

The Minotaur of twisted love

contorts against grace,

O Hamlet Falcon-Ace –

his den of hate-mark drove the dove

out of her rightful nesting-place.

Her forum of good will –

Columbian windowsill

of human fellowship (Dante’s

& Aristotle’s animale

compagnevole) – sheds

reflective limestone beds

of ever-new Itasca springs (ey

yo) out of unfathomable depths

of Manitou-benevolence

(Ghost who in silence

walks beside you, sweet Princeps).

Ophelia, Horatio, Francesco,

Juliet... heart-Jonahs

surfacing from Okeanos –

anchored fresco-arc astride Frisco.

5.4.17

Spooky distances (for 3.14159............).......)...

APPLE PIE

Hobo drowses in his Einstein field

of asphodel, spooky distances.

Life’s tender differences...

only mauve peonies on copper shield.

Irrational yearning for the earth

might be the shortest path

to Providence.  Wrath

of History’s a concave labyrinth –

your soul must wash a dusty planet

down Big Muddy, Hobo.

Rise from your bed of woe;

our Hero beckons from his granite

lintel toward the circling sun.

Path P (transcendental

for each chaste equal

guest of compassing compassion).

The one who went to live with Indians.

Blackstone, Yellow Sweeting

apple-man – his greeting

(like sweet Williams’ own) a Both-Hands

Welcome, Minnehaha flute –
ray of soul liberty,

loop of Easter Rabbi...

Hart, Malcolm, Giulietta’s route

bent (parallactic) toward the light.

A catenary smile

or Life-Saver will

thread sad grooves into a chariot.

3.14.16

Mississippi River, from Indian Mounds Park (St. Paul)

Shakespeare's acorn

MICRO-MOSAIC

This circle of 7 emerald palms

(with 8 red dots across

lifelines) was pressed

by hand – an infant hand, Phoebe’s –

under the guiding eye of Grace

(in Providence).  Now

I set my cup (micro-

mosaic from Byzantium) in place

atop these marble squares, that trace

brass compass & sundial

of Roger Williams.  Trial

by English fire (Coke’s carapace) 

was his – to bring the Narragansett

word for liberty

to London (& to me).

The sovereignty of good, in its

vernacular incarnation, is

one global, crystalline,

turtleshell acorn –

Shakespearean lap of happiness

(skullcap, human Golgotha-dome

worn meekly in Ferrara

& Venice – Ravenna,

Providence...) – What cheer?  Welcome,

warbles Canonicus, chief

Shaker under raven-

falls (Columbian) –

his handshake stronger than belief.

1.27.16

oh... & Forth of July was finished on 5.28 (2000).

5.28 (as again I repeat myself) : the day William Blackstone was buried in Cumberland RI, on Study Hill, 1675. Also St. William's Day (the day Guillem de Gellone - crusader turned monk made saint - died).

5.29 : The day Study Hill was burned to the ground by a Narragansett raiding party (all W. Blackstone's books & notebooks vanished). My birthday. RI Statehood Day.

On 5.28 ('35?) the Golden Gate Bridge opened for traffic.

Legend has it : when Roger Williams disembarked in Providence after being exiled from Beantown, he was greeted by his Narragansett hosts with, "What cheer, Netop?" [netop = friend]

In Stubborn Grew et al. I occasionally mention something mysterious called the "path P", which came originally from an old Rhode Island document signed by the Narragansett sachem King Philip - "P his Mark", but in my business also referred to the "path Pushkin" (following the lost black cat) or "path Petersburg" or, in July, the "path Phoebe".

Curious to find in Sachs book that (according to Sachs anyway) letter "P" in Melville's private Moby Dick code symbolizes "Word", and in Greek "P" is the letter rho (ie. "Little Rhody")..