clarification on kay (for j & j)
by tomverve
Posted to Action Poetry on 2001-08-13 15:46:00
i saw her in a lonely moment
like a delicate dark angel
with yet that aura showing
a beautiful glowing elegance–
(and yes, i have a sex drive) —
i played out my infatuation from afar
and lamented the distances
in my stifled quiet shyness that
i recognized partially in her–
does this make of me
a reprehensible brat?
and how many whores make their practice
of baggy jeans and long-sleeved shirts?
later saw her scratch lines
induced in some desperate misery–
lost for the right words
(you know well my dearth of eloquence),
and still a transient speck (if that)
in the farthest fringes of her
emotional complexities–
she had her circle
(seen em with my own eyes)
and was seeing help
(professional kind – she told me)
and what more than these had i to offer
but consolances sounding tiny rote
coming from speckly me, no matter
the timbre of the compassion’s note?
(i knew this
since i knew too
tonedeaf disconsolation
and had heard intonations falling flat myself —
(and please pardon my occasional outbreak
of bratpack sadness–
but tangentially
this is where jack’s road resonates in me–
the incessant leaping interstitials
between crazed yass nights
and bleak sad lamp posts
with silhouettes receding into the rearview horizon,
i imagine
yet closer than they appear [hackneyed alert])
) —
and thus the disaffected powerlessness
of action at a distance
in the stranded domains of locality
and yes, when finally i gathered
what feeble slivers of courage i had
to transcend pleasentries &
speak with meaning,
to close those distances
and test my intuitions of kindred,
and felt my throat plunge cliffless
with the ringing of the phone,
she was not there
it’s been years
and i have never seen or spoken
to her since, tho i never did
truly speak to begin, i know
importance where?
what end in life?
i do not belittle logos strife–
in my worst moments
i too have stood at the foot of abyss
and questioned the design of existence
and known the brunt of its gravity–
but in my best i have been elevated
in the sublime lift
of tender arms and softest kiss–
(with degrees of friendship
and good drugs
and resting with nature
and pondering the transcendent and the strange
and learning
and bellyache laughter
and childlike playfulness
and deep sleep
and good dreams
and cetera,
lying inbetween) —
and i know from her poem
she has known it too
i meant only to speak of my pining
for finding this again,
without loss and without end–
and not at the callous expense of
insensitivity to another’s wounded sense–
and maybe this makes of me a fool
and maybe shades of cynic too,
but for this i tend to think
all else fades into degrees of
dispensable for the joy
the most intense and most serene–
yes it has been terribly cliched
but what just what is better?
nothing i have felt or seen
i have heard a lyric sung
“i’d rather be no one than
someone with no one”
(please tolerate my citing trite) —
i am not of this philosophy
but can sympathize its source–
it is true, the malnourished may survive–
but to truly thrive in full?
at least for those famished pangs
of hunger, what other end in life?
what better means to sate
the gaping jaw abyss?
i have never intended battle here–
if so, i may as well have proceeded
with some personal affronts–
rather felt dragged out
senselessly
(hopefully in misunderstanding–
mine or yours)
to defend my words–
and why should i be smiling
while acerbic vitriol is spat
in rains upon my eye
for feeling what i feel
or saying how i say?
you may extrapolate all you like–
a dearth of eloquence is not always
a dearth of sensibility
if all of this yet makes of me
the vacuous dumb tortoise breed
then take me to the gallows
i suppose
but remind me where my faultlines lie
and if i have been caustic, it is only
in regard to the words leveled,
not the minds that spoke–
in fact
at the risk of seeming to dole
disingenous butter-ups
(you will have to take my word)
and for what it may be worth
to you,
to the extent i know of you
i respect (most of) your words,
your wild composed spontaneity
for its grasp of verse & pretty visions
of loss and love and endless awe for life, and
for the degree to which these trump my own
peace please and understanding