on Holy Saturday

RIVER-TOY

On Holy Saturday, the Great Sabbath

when Jesus murmured, It is finished

& in his grave (like Jonah’s fish)

rested… as in an Ocean River bath…

When 12-yr-old Henry grandly admired

his glue-stiff model (Old Ironsides)

alight with joy, & tired pride…

– as just now Sophie dashed across the yard

to him, 50 years later – to display

the paper flower boat (sky-

blue, & Clizia-giallo) she

runs off to let fly, down the Mississippi…

her tender river-toy… her revery, her rest.

& while Henry gyred – wacky

as Coney Island in Waconia –

like Hermann Gödel, in his final nest

of parenthetical limit (righteous exactitude

of unknowing) – across the path

from Sarah’s parents (math

of relativity – some spousal quark beatitude)…

Where the world ends, & begins again;

at Swan Point, where her mother lies

who died the day his father’s eyes

first opened.  Amid the Great Congregation

of synagogue & church (pain-bearing world)

one pearl-eye opens at the prow

of raven-beak Argo.  Mark thou

how contrapuntal matrices of love enfold.

4.11.20

Ravenna Diagram Reading Guide #5

Again, check previous blog entry here for more info.

RAVENNA DIAGRAM READING GUIDE #5

GRAVE GARDEN (p.7)

Not much to say about this poem.  There is a sense that, from the opening poem of the book (“Potter’s Whorl”), the clay wheel is spinning in centrifugal fashion, sending feelers or tentacles outward toward themes and elements that will see further development.

“Camelot” : always in background is memory of JFK, especially his Irish and Newport connections.  And general issue of violence and sacrifice in human history (and American history).

“8-pt. symmetry” : has implications relative to Pound’s question about future epic poetry : “can you enter the great acorn of light?”

“cemetery, by the river” : Swan Point Cemetery, Providence

“Ephphatha” : “be opened” : phrase used by Jesus in the Gospels as he puts a bit of clay over blind man’s eyes and restores his sight

“saya-y-manta” : Spanish women’s robe which reveals only the face.  Mentioned in Melville’s tale Benito Cereno

“brave’s game (a furnace dance)” : again, a fusion of Native American and Biblical motifs (Dakota sundance ceremony; Shadrach, Mesach & Abednego in the fiery furnace)

“Tracks in the snow (redcap, lance)” : image drawn from Parzival, Wolfram von Eschenbach’s version of the Grail story

spring crucible

ASPHALT PATH

Yesterday your birthday, Papa.

92, mild ghost.  Sun-wheel

set at Swan Point... seal

of a woman’s self-extinction.  Ah,

woeful calendar (Coatlicue).

Strife of father & son.

Friday black sun,

aboriginal sin (hey ey

yo).  Here in Minneapolis

snow, interring April

in one wide hexagonal,

preserves a buried man in ice

(Resurrection Cemetery).

Henry ascends the asphalt

path from heart’s tumult

to frozen Father of his Country.

Washington Ave. Bridge.  Yet

(wobbling, wavering

within your shadowy

ring of flame) – dawn’s pale promise!

Man’s faithless diffidence his own

life sentence, we

depend upon your mercy

to raft us into Libertas again –

mysterious Jonah in the “33”

(Mars’ den) whose hum

breaches delirium,

wind-bred to share (Nazarene glee).

4.13.18

Indomitable busker

It's a mystery to me (a mystery for which I'm grateful) how these long pilgrimage-de-Henri sagas adjust themselves to my own contingencies.  They round themselves up in their own good time.  We are told art is practice practice practice, & maybe that's what it is.  "There's a divinity that shapes our ends, / Rough-hew them how we will" (Hamlet).

For example : I'm moving to Minnesota in a matter of days.  It's been a roller-coaster year, yet this Ravenna Diagram thingum has persisted, kept on keepin' on.  Now - a few days before we leave, & in the midst of much pack-up anxious biz - the fourth chapter of the poem, and a big structural cornice, draws to a close, seemingly in a fairly-fitting fashion (how can I know).

I'm thankful for the poem time.  I'm thankful for the moonshine of this little Ocean State.

EARTHY TAVERN

This polished late October light.

Burnishes each diamond

of the backyard iron

fence.  One survivor-cricket

churrs behind spruce (indomitable

busker).  Over the rail

a wave of clematis still

surfs; the massive parasol

of luminous russet dogwood leaves

still braces (on its sturdy

mast) against a gusty

autumn breeze.  Halloween in the eaves.

I’m leaving very soon.  The golden

spider packs his poison-

bag, curls (frozen)

in a thread-vortex.  I be beholden

to my Ariadne.  In her hazel eye

the gold lambswool, yellow

Corn Maid poncho flow

into one clay design – pendentive sigh

of wild oats panicle (brown

dangling bird-feet

elegant & neat

as many-rimmed Ravenna urn).

My host is flown.  Like Stella Maris

over the ridge, at Swan

Point – pivoting on équinoxe

de printemps (April 12 it was

                    *

this year)... like Beatrice’s Florence,

born le 4 Juillet – or taut

Francesca, by her net

of Inca wool... ou sont les neiges,

maintenant?  They’ll ride my splintered

coracle back home.

Or (gone threadbare) roam

my prairie west – O mulish cowherd

wind-wag, tickled to Frisco Bay!

Morning Star, look homeward

kind upon yon way-weird

son.  Apollinaire, with calumet...

the wars is over, anyway

– wars in my old heart.

Ravenna’s where we start

again (light brdftprnt of Dante).

Motif of a sacrifice.

Eternity turned

ice-cold (solid,

absolute).  Not nice –

unless you reckon yet again.

The dogwood mast is creaking

in the slanting afternoon;

winter will be coming soon

for Hen, who gathers everyone

into his earthy tavern

(like a Grecian urn)

across far distances... (American).

10.23.15

dogwood (& spruce) on Fisher St.