like a gouache by David Jones

LITTLE GROTTO

Day like a gouache by David Jones.

Diaphanous vision, muted

by sea-wind, raincloud.

Mountain, meadow, rust (earth tones).

The nightmare of the Great War

like sulphur tuning fork

or buried line in Eden Park

commingles its dilemma in a metaphor

like rose in steel dust (Roger’s compass,

pointing NNW).

& Image of the Beast is

emblem for the matrix of that enterprise

encrypted at the center of a corn maze

where Satan & his Minotaur

(ICE-bound, possessed) are

snared (handcuffed in their own cold glaze).

The Man of Lawlessness, like Terrible

Ivan – he makes his own desire

the absolute measure;

he’s lost to caritas (in his own bubble).

Imagine Ghiberti’s golden doors

at the Baptistery in Florence

with angels forced to dance

to the lash of demonic matadors…

imagine Eugenio, alongside Clizia

locked in the library

with Mussolini – her sturdy

sun-glance, over the chessboard… ah,

*

bright wings!  When Everyman & Woman

breathe in the heartland

of their living temple… &

Joachim’s eagle plummets through the Plan

of Ages!  Providential restoration, O

downglide of Holy Ghost!

Multitudinous host

of human happiness – blue emerald glow

of soft & silent cat’s-eye revolutions,

roll!  & be the planetary

hearthland, wide prairie…

deep swell of Thunderbird flute sessions!

Because all the world’s a stage, coach;

the play’s the salty verse

for catching Eddy the Perverse,

who suckles his Corona like a roach

out of the Minotaur’s bleak heart –

rotten as… who can say?

God knows.  Only way

’s to pinwheel back where we start,

Pocahontas – up to the swirling

origin of springs.

A little grotto brings

its whisper of clear water.  Everything

draws near.  Pleroma for Fisher King

(little lad in oak tree)

shines, golden, leafy.  His

mother smiles… rainbows from nothing.

3.28.20

translated to an island

SIMPLE IMMANENCE

Constitution Day.  Coke’s legacy,

translated to an island rose –

mother & nurse of repose

on the throne of Imago Dei – si?

Your lambswool, Giuliana – moss-green

through the red-dust desert.

Alighieri’s tomb, in quiet

(such as lie, smothered in grass, by San

Vitale).  Twin peacocks, maybe –

between two almond trees?

In the Ferrara freeze

(Micòl shivering in her garage)... see?

Your solar emblems not for me,

Ezra.  Marble from Ravenna

swiped for Rimini, & gloria –

the simple immanence of meek Marie

shunned like a ghetto-child.  & so

the merry-go-round of sacrifice

creaks back to 1913, Paris...

Ugo, Parisina, burnt to ash once more

for the war to end all wars (before

the end).  A rust-bronze Penny

blackens backward, in Gehenna –

from dim crossroad will she soar

like diamond Southern Cross.  She is

lips’ ghost dance ring-

around-the-rosy... clear spring

Pax-water (your West Branch Isis).

9.17.19

speaking the poetry of dense & difficult

GOLDFINCH APTITUDE

In the late afternoon, old Emperor

Henry the Ghoul lies abed

beneath the wallpaper’s red

roses (spread by his late father

for his mother).  The sun is not a god

nor is his Uncle Ez,

despite the pitchmen on the rez.

Frayed tribes will not succumb; Benito’s rod

is not benign, nor ever shall be.

The motorized dream, from

vortex of survivor-shame

after the panoramic slaughter-sea

of Ypres, Somme, & Meuse-Argonne –

like a neoplatonic fantasy

of utopian autocracy,

with phantom Isis Medusa-icon

wailing like siren out of Empyrean

over the shattered spectacle

of your culture-chronicle,

Ezra – so who shall have the succession?

The special providence of a sparrow...

the goldfinch aptitude

for simple gratitude.

& when the Eternal comes, you will know,

Osip (along the axis of the earth).

The covenant of love

donated from above

for good – so we might share it forth.

4.29.19

Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these

RAVENNA DIAGRAM  READING GUIDE #9

CLOUD-GIRDLE  (p. 11)

This poem was first published in the journal West Branch.

“El Anatsui” : prominent Ghanaian sculptor, born 1944

“Anansi” : West African folktale character with Trickster qualities; often takes form of spider

“weaves diaphanous / Byzantium veils” : some of El Anatsui’s works are large wall hangings that shimmer with luminous colors, produced by threads, thin wires, bits of scrap metal and other materials

“Something greater than fin-de-siecle Vienna...” : shimmering gold of wall-hangings calls to mind “Golden Phase” of Viennese artist Gustav Klimt.  Comparison framed in terms echoing Gospel text contrasting Jesus with other kings and prophets

“sinuous, sooth- // siring Solomon” : King Solomon, credited for wisdom.  Bible claims he authored thousands of poems.  The serpentine phrasing foreshadows allusions to Hart Crane in following stanzas

“Makossa, Ebeano, Dark Sailor...” : evocative names of African beers whose bottle caps adorn the wall-hangings

“forlorn cells of Africa” : see Crane’s poem “Black Tambourine”

“amiable fellowship... diamond cobra” : fellowship of people of good will is source of the culminating “diamond cobra” (“wise as serpents”) of both human solidarity and beautiful art works

“Solomon in all his glory...” : Jesus’ assertion that the beauty of wildflowers is greater than that of Solomon.  Glories of art returned to their source in nature and the earth

“field lilies, Flanders / epitaphs” : and the earth is also a grave.  Here motif of World War I first appears in R.D.

“Grandfather’s / brass shell, after St. Mihiel” : poet’s grandfather, Edward S. Gould, served as artillery captain in the AE.F.

“Copper wire, / steel helmets” : war contrasted to art, and El Anatsui’s use of these metals

“greater mettle” : pun on metal.  Creative art in a struggle with violence

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

Election Restoration Day

BLACK LAMB

Henry’s diary for a dying day

saunters into November.

After Wars to End All War

will Guillem find his smoky way?

Apollinaire in a Sikh turban

waits out the head wound.

Carried to the ground

from a Paris window (11/11).

Long way to Tipperary, Gil.

Grandpa in his macintosh

in Belgium rain... gosh,

long ago, Captain.  Farewell.

So long.  Today’s Election Day.

Are we of the electorate

yet?  Like a checkmate

in a game with yourself, aye –

Reds & Blues – rival brothers

in mired mirror war.

Each bears a torch

for her – the midnight soul mother,

those faces of benevolent fathers

children carry deep

into their forests of sleep.

Only the branding iron cauters

its contrary mosaics (through the Age

of Iron).  Black Elk

troubles the star-milk

with one royal touch (smoky sage-

                   *

brush sand mandala).  Soft, Selkie –

blue dolphin from Skye...

this mournful rage to die

sulks in the dark heart, MLK.

You must lift it from us, black lamb.

Forever & ever, light

candle through the night –

mass-vortex Gal of each I am, I am.

She smiles through waves, ineffable

Wisdom – heart’s foundation,

coracle of liberation.

She lifted Jonah (willing Abel)

into eye of hurricane –

the diamond matrix,

Everysoul’s six

ways – your dream song, Hen.

Her word burns like a fire in the Book

of Love, her Testament.

What Maggie meant

when she saw the young Nazir look

from the bright eyes of the gardener

& shouted, He is risen!

Out from your earth-borne

everlasting fire, world-fashioner!

So Morning Star whorls her self-sacrifice

& Guillaume flings another jest

& Henry’s safety net

swings sister-dove from rigor mortis.

11.6.18

Wonder what a Calvin Coolidge blog would sound like.

"The blog of America is blogging."

Grandpa Gould wrote him a letter once in the 1920s informing him we were related. Never heard back. Typical Gould. I mean Silent Cal.

Grandpa was Captain of Battery B in WW I. Fired the last shot of the war, he said. He had the brass casing around the apartment. I heard later that a lot of artillerymen did that - waited a few minutes after Armistice, then shot off one more, just for the memory.

He pulled out one of my loose teeth once. He said, "come over here, Henry, I just want to have a look." Then yanked it right out, & sat there grinning at me with his big front teeth. O, Grandpa. (He was good at that sort of thing, being an avid fisherman.)

He was City Assessor for Minneapolis for over 30 years. (Probably had to do a lot of fishing around there, too.)

When I interviewed him for my 6th-grade history paper on WW I, he showed me his prayer-book full of shrapnel. His tent had taken a direct hit while he was visiting the latrine.