[p. 172]
I
Under-
earth currents, Gaia, Hannahanna,
mother of the Lady Verdure
all dresst in green her leafy graces, in margins
the writ illumined, wreathed round
with pomegranate
split for in-betweens of jeweld hive
red seed upon red seed,
ripe peach, pear, apple cut
to show the core,
vine tendril into talon curls,
faces in the fruit occur.
The artist of the margin
works abundancies
and sees the theme is much too big
to cover all o’er, a decorative frieze
out of earthly proportion to the page,
needs vast terms, unspecified
even boredom of those
plains that from Denver bend
east, east, east.
The mid-Westem mind
differs in essentials
—another time zone.
In Iowa they do not dig
[p. 173]
the swarming locale, this port of
recall. There's no
Buddhist temple in the mid-West town.
Earth drains down the Old Man River and runs out
in swamps and shallows of the Caribbean.
They do not remember the body of
them waters
but stand with feet upon the ground
against the
run to the mythic sea, the fabulous.
II
A
diary poem
to Day, Gaia, Earth
—murther, murmurer, demurrer.
The old have crept out to day
after noon and go out so slow
forth lifting up their bones
painfully-—it's a caution
to see their faring. Then
a sparrow smasht upon the sidewalk.
I'm not so old but I can put
the thought away, my foot
before my foot,
climbing the hill as if for rime
my teeth are gnashing, and again
the thought returns
that we conquer life itself to live,
survive what we are.
[p. 174]
III
The head crusht sideways, the wings
spread
out
as if embracing the sidewalk, too close
for
shadow,
the immediate! How bright the sun
surrounds
them,
and day by day they
sun
themselves
turning
a day's eye turning as the sun passes
over head.
IV
These figures: a snake-coil of water,
a bird-wheel in the
sky,
to the great wheel of sooty shear-waters
passing north
counter-clockwise as far as the
horizon
between shore and the islands
make their announcement
in the heart of things. Here
our West's the Orient,
our continent the sea.
In the heart itself a pang
as if the very Day moved northward
over the face of the waters.
[p. 175]
The mass of clouds moves up against
the voice, bright breasts
blinding the eye as I attack
their moving front to find
a place in which the eye might rest.
V
I am so far from you,
come up the years
so far, a continent
looms between.
In the far, the Appalachians
belong to time before our time
the Urals are a part of.
Continents of water and of earth,
Gaia! Time's mother too
must wear guises,
hop on one leg
and hide her head in a hut,
dance with the rest among the maskt guys,
It's still Saturday
before Easter
and Love's hero lies
in the nest of our time.
In Banyalbufar the little doll of the Virgin
once more meets the sorrowing procession,
the black-clad walkers
before the green of April, and looks upon
His corpse they carry forth
to meet her.
[p. 176]
Effeminized, the soul is Sleeping Beauty
or Snow White who waits
for Sunday's kiss to wake her.
Time zone by time zone
across the continent dawn so comes
breaking the shell of flowers
a wave
Earth makes in turning
a crest
against tomorrow breaks.
VI
There is only the one time.
There is only the one god.
There's only the one promise
and from its flame
the margins of the page flare forth.
There's only the one page,
the rest remains
in ashes. There is only
the one continent, the one sea—
moving in rifts, churning, enjambing,
drifting feature from feature.
from Roots and Branches,
New York: New Directions, 1964.
