in Deserto Rosso

LITTLE ROOM

Like Giuliana’s little boy, in Deserto Rosso

for 6 weeks I was on a ventilator

(“iron lung” back then).  For

Guillain-Barré.  That was 1956 or so.

Paralysis for Henry Fish Quattoir -

great reckoning in little room.

Like coffin-casket, in full bloom;

like April, breathing frailty to power.

Who shall restore the sickly Lord?

There is no temple on the earth,

no glorious basilica that’s worth

the wonder of a single child (a word

once heard with flooding tears, in Ramah).

You who are sum of all

creation – telos, quintessence, lovely corona…

behold the Argos-eyed canoe of Noah.

How the universe giulianizes in you,

Giuliana (as Cusanus wrote)!

You are both verde crown & mote

of mustard seed… the whole tree, Julio!

Now Henry faints… his epileptic storm

of vertigo (at sight of blood)

flings him to Frisco neighborhood.

Where Juliet ascends… to join a swarm

of victims, falling like rain from Golden Gate

(our Twin Towers).  He stretches

out his arms… the King of Wretches,

Grail King.  Melek, MLK (Good Friday fate).

4.1.20

Ravenna Diagram Reading Guide #8

R.D. READING GUIDE #8

HOLE IN THE DAY  (p.10)

“Hole-in-the-Day” : prominent Ojibwe chieftain who tried to rally tribal support for the 1862 Dakota uprising in Minnesota.  He was assassinated in 1868 near the Crow Wing Agency by a group of Ojibwe men.  Here, the raven is represented as a kind of “hole in the day”.

“left the ark” : Noah, on the ark, sent out ravens to look for signs of dry land

“Furnace... against azure” : raven in sky imaged as “anti-matter X-factor”, a metaphysical sign

“Oil-power” : pun on oeuil (French for “eye”).  Replays metaphorical changes on the “third eye” etc. of previous poems

“fodder for wretched // prophet” : the prophet Elijah was fed by ravens sent by YHWH

“Hovers / outside” : the spiritual otherness signaled by the raven

“Night’s black... one sphere’s damaged / grey” : the uncanny raven-otherness seems to return to earth through the back door

“One Rahab-hair” : the Biblical Rahab opened the “back door” allowing Joshua to capture Jericho

“In the theater” : poet sees muse-like figure or Dantean “old flame” in the Avon Cinema (Providence)

“Geraldine Fitzgerald” : lead actress in bio-pic (Woodrow) Wilson, and other films.  The “circularity” of her name, and its echoes of Ireland and JFK, are marked here

“The hour draws nigh...” : by means of some alchemical movie magic, the cosmopolitan spirit of the film, and the actual presence of “Geraldine” in the theater, evoke this hopeful (Elijah-like) prophecy

Whitsun yodeling

SHADY RIVER

Hobo goes with the flow of things,

he sinks into the green

entanglement of vine

& grape, the stream’s faint ripplings.

His logos is a Lincoln knot

scratched into driftwood

while Turtledove cooed

overhead (so reads Coyot’).

The knot binds everything, as with

her singing spine, the Argo

bound over il Mar Nero –

Noé’s noeud of adoration (myth

turned moth turned monarch seal).

Echoes from a cave

one vanished brave –

Love’s breadcrumb, who became a meal.

All come to bloom in memory...

as the canoe in the garage

scented with Micòl-image

breathes again inscript in Bassani.

A grail of dew sprinkles the summer grass

with Hobo’s oasis-gems;

yearning no one condemns

uplifted where it shall not pass –

into that monarch-realm of dark cedar

where a thrush warbles

& salt breeze marbles

lilac dusk (by Po-Boy River).

5.22.18

digging in the dirty green

AYE-AYE

The dirty green of the dollar bill.

Gardener George, earwigged

on one side (with a big

little Mona Lisa smile).

The eye over the pyramid (annuit

coeptis) on the other.

Levitating, mother!

Mammon, touching his limit –

a gilded pharaoh, forced to step

sideways (into the river-

sand).  Busy beaver

out of Illinois might be princeps

round here (nobody knows

til all the votes are counted).

We are all the Lord’s anointed

Preacher-Judge (siege perilous)

leers in the face of b-flat storm –

Cordelia, ascend

your throne, bend

everyone to teeming agape (love’s form).

The government shall be upon

his shoulder (right to left)

until the desolate bereft

& greedy soul relents – a human

Imogen emerges, lowly

& victorious.

Dancing the periplus

of Arg-Noah (144, aye-aye).

12.12.17

6-way pearlosphere

SHADY GROVE

Water & limestone, flowing water

& flint.  One flinty poet.

Raven (Cautantowwit)

bent southwest... shady potter

evening the light patter

into one plate

(a starfish template).

Love knit into the gray matter –

after Apollo’s leaf-shaken by Laura

& Guillaume flutes his

last letter to Texas

(chère Annie della Santa Povera).

Orpheus mining for Eurydice

or Hobo for a spare soul

bear witness to the whole

arcade of an elliptical theodicy –

the love that filters through the frame

of selfishness, into the wheel

of goodness nonpareil –

along a zigzag trail (from shame

to limpid sunshine, fear to hope).

This labyrinth of green

copper, spring’s has-been

graven into will-be – mighty trope

of Lincoln profile, lifting from

rust-brown decades

(gilded cage, parades...)

– an infinitesimal infant hum

              *

like flute-call of a one-stringed

gusle, or trompette

marine – sweet lure set

looping gracefully from stringent

steel twin pillars – fleet trimaster

launched on azure wave-

arc from the knave-

matrix of simian disaster –

Noah’s rhombus of acacia,

world-gathering lantern-

ship of ringèd Saturn

bowed with figurehead (Columbia)

of grey rain   hummin being

or bee hummin   human

              *

bird   shade   Galilean

Nazir   nightingale   circling

like adamant flint iamond

or polyalmond eye

within the 6-way

pearlosphere   Warlpiri-monde

or center of Center, N.D.

where Black Elk springs

his sundance rings

of omnipresent dove-activity

so dive in   dive to the divine

drive-in   twine-chariot

of agate Agape   knot-

spun to lift   into ascension-heaven

              *

Franklin Bridge repair is almost done.

The river flows midéwé way

toward Memorial Day.

We spiral back where we’ve begun.

That granite portal of an Ocean State

where Roger steps from his

canoe – old Prospect Terrace,

over Providence – rêve-songs originate

there, looking west (toward St. Louis

& Frisco).  Late May

brings Rhody Statehood Day,

centenary of JFK (his Newport, ours) –

& in Paris (1913) Apollinaire

beheld the Rite of Spring

before Great War (engulfing

Earth in violence... pity... despair).

A tiny hummingbird speeds blossomward.

Grey sound-waves buzz

like microscopic doves

or bees around oak honey-hoard.

They’re everywhere.  The hollow tock

of woodpecker foretells

a carillon (death-knells,

birth-pangs) – oak droning, Knock.

It shall be opened.  The shady grove

teems into restoration.

Cup-bearing dome-creation.

Wine-stained Milky Way (Manitou-trove).

5.25.17

the law is not a sword

WILD GRAPES

A timid April tiptoes toward

her Spring.  Gun-gray sky,

leaf-brown river.  Hobo’s eye

moseys from earth to heaven (&

backward, again).  Raven loops

his knotty diagram,

figures 8 a.m.

some eats (thin scraps he scoops

betwixt instinctual communal hates

of squawky flocks, nations).

Noah’s inflammations

Eli salts – warns, Don’t be late.

Fuming smoke signals just

add to his unease.

Alighieri aims to please –

his bones rest in Franciscan dust,

his narrow beak angles from spark

to spark.  Hearth-embers

flicker out drear winters of

scalding be-ice.  Imperial dark

is splintered by gold threads of light –

lamb-thin graphene ravels

the cave-mouth – mangy hovels

hearken to trompette marine (slight

return).  Apollinaire or Orpheus,

shepherds in New Orleans,

Ravenna... rustic scenes.

Under an overpass (U.S.

               *

or Rus) refugees convene,

lean farmers share

their plows... while everywhere

stones ricochet like bayonets (mean

answers mean, unkind unkind).

The law is not a sword;

it is a binding word

uniting variable humankind

proceeds from love, & so returns –

one warm traveling lamp

from isolated camp to camp

where Roger & Canonicus trade yarns

& Edward Elk defends each Everyone

upon egalitarian

thread-frame (one golden

safety net for all the wobbly children

of sweet Manitou).  Cautantowwit

whispers a Narragansett

name over each hamlet-

nest in Providence.  Let’s eat.

The gathering of crumbs, wild grapes

& hobos has begun.

Mississippi sun

beams west, southwest... Pacific shapes

crest arcs of rainbow (orange, indigo,

azure & rose)... an Ocean

State anchors her span –

Hope’s incarnation (Jonah show).

4.10.17

beneath gray Bruegel sky

WAVE-CRADLE

Crows ink beneath gray Bruegel sky.

A line from A to B

zigzags spacetime – see?

So raven vanishes in Noah’s eye.

Between two points, a yawning Ocean.

Infinite intensity

of black-hole density

draws yesterday into its spin.

What is your personal specific gravity?

The poem is gray pebble,

obscure soldat (trouble

for no one).  Ordinary Smitty

whose greatcoat pocket holds an agate.

Lodestone of a jay

tracing King’s Highway

into the calyx of a ruse (checkmate).

It is Path P, the chi-rho

branch – diamond

mandala of almond;

Black Elk milk road (ey yo).

Love is the tread between twin pillars –
only a glance of weightless

spiderweb.  Inverness

of vernal tenderness... wind, stars...

when the bow sways in its wave-cradle

& Ithaca, Iona, Eire

lift like green fire

Skye-perpendicular – familiar grail-dreidel.

1.25.17

in Red Wing

JOY-DIALECT

The great apes crouching toward the east

to meet the light

Cautantowwit in flight

southwest, southwest (a raven-feast)

echo the caw-caw over Noah’s ark

(breadcrumbs for Elijah).

The future is for Jonah

or for Jeanne to bear (as oak

from acorn weathers Thunderer,

Earth-Shaker).  From these

enormous clay crocks

of Red Wing pottery (grain elevator,

stoneware casque) one Blue Morpho

or ochre-black Monarch

skims toward blind Psyche-

park (houseboat for mosey-Hobo) –

when Hero rises from the womb

of Nile or Mississippi

like Huck, like Jim (she

will be free!) across the loom

of frozen rim (Troezen or Petersburg).

In Red Wing, Frances Densmore

heard the drums pour

rhythm underneath the river – bug

slant like water spider’s perfect

pitch-black whispering

through tympanum – sing

beyond ice-frame (joy-dialect).

11.1.16 

Frances Densmore exhibit, Goodhue County Historical Society Museum (Red Wing, MN)

Noah's yawl

DANTE SCHOOL

Long ago in Florence, Alighieri

smashed the limestone font

at the Baptistery – Don’t

Panic! – to save a little boy

from drowning.  His prophetic sign,

a riposte for his own exile –

sluiced out with bile

& blood of lawlessness (Italian

style).  The sea rides high, the rain

seems endless.  Human

callousness a given,

leaden sinker-weights anchored in pain

call for a coracle, a basket-woven

safety net (to keep

the child alive, upon

the deep).  Cross-stitch the waves then,

Raven – paint Noah’s yawl afloat

until we memorize the name

that hawsers through this game

of crosshairs (golden, black & white).

Only a shadow over the sea;

an eyelash, lancing

a tiny tear.  So bring

your harp now, Queequeg – free

that pearl-feathered quasi-gull

whose omnipresence bobs

the wavy globe.  Corncobs

& acorns in Polenta (Dante school).

8.16.16

the order of the day

LITTLE MOTH

Jesus likely would not recognize

what we have made of him –

exemplar (in rite & hymn)

of royal prehistoric Zeus

or Pharaoh-gilded rain.  Human

mind climbs out of beast.

Not long ago, the feast

was drunken heads – the scar remain.

The ink dries on a twisted pattern.

Tyrant’s father-hamlet,

laden sack – fried omelet-

omen (under midnight sun).

A raven zigzags over Noah’s

bow (yew, cypress,

acacia).  Her nest

will not be found on land, selah.

Someone, singing a see-saw

in Galilee.  Sea-

shanty (shanti, shanti)

maybe.  Malcolm?  Simone?  Naw...

maybe.  Light metamorphosis

the order of the day.

Pines, tamarack (way

back beyond Ravenna, Beatrice)...

A little moth molts molten gold

out of black stone,

southwest (of high Zion).

Wings ray to Nazir tinder... (fold).

2.19.16

A missive from Petropolis

DEAD RECKONING

In the clear winter light, the bright life

swings through memory

like steady Mississippi

viewed from a bridge.  My wife,

whispers a tottery unknown Schweik,

hugging his beloved

flak-jacket (bullet-

holes & all) – Maya Jhenna, that Mike

mumbles to Neva (ghost of a muzhik-

moosh)... my shining

inkling, engravening wing-

back turtledove... (nuncle be sick).

Awhile soul clap in jail, this bird

will penetrate the day –

a wormhole P-Jay,

serpentine (heart’s own sail-shroud).

Like Raven, still criss-crowing

over Noah’s bobble-head –

whose flinty beak’s dead

reckoning will note the gorgeous

hillside, blooming afar, over the sea –

so that prophetic castaway

(Hobo-Jonah) will play

black Orpheus to Coulombe-Bee;

a missive from Petropolis

(long-axled hasp)

plumbs Negrepontis –

limns Clio’s last golden gasp.

2.9.16

Circus leaps

RAVENNA DOOR

This winter Mississippi, silver-

blue as a kingfisher,

must be my Ocean here,

now.  Old Rhode Island (Roger

Williams tugging at his oar

along the Narragansett

shore) is like an inlet

glinting on Ravenna door.

This plain flatland’s no nacre

objet d’art – no Rimini-

Jiminy jingle-tree

nor fizzle-pop of firecracker.

It’s the tip of a massive iceberg

mound, with Ojibwa scrawls 

from International Falls.

It’s a raven-furled ironwork

Father of Waters (del Espiritu

Santo).  The dark ink spills

from Andean condor hills

like shade from a single pine... you,

yew.  One sinuous dove-grey thread

from woolen crown (above

almond eyes) – Love’s

quipu, drawn from riverbed –

the peacock bow of freedom’s O

(a circuit of Noahtic leaps

that signal seamanship).

Her line grips like a sheepfold

fence (through centuries of snow).

12.3.15

Mississippi sundown

INCA BIRD

Mississippi sundown.  Meek

flock of cottonwoods

leans toward sand-

bank... listen to the river speak.

Noah’s raven criss-crossed the ocean

weaving black on blue, 

salt over salt (sez you).

My splotchy gouache representation

wings away north, south... follows

Big Muddy to her delta

denouement, selah.

Breathes on clay (rows, rose).

This Inca bird, like a Cuzco condor

(or Marshall St. bridge

bald eagle)... no prison-

pigeon, but flight to the rondure –

a well of black water, with stars

in a lattice (for stories).

The Ghost, says Maximus,

prehends the insolence of wars –

lift up your hearts, she cries,

lift up.  Paradise

is a habit of eyes &

hands, not formulae;

lips rim a coracle (of cedar

curve & silver plow)

so that you too may know,

my child – the Earth (from a star).

11.21.15