for Johanna
(conclusion, beginning in #99)
SIXTEEN
On Sumter St I’ve learnéd to distrust my words.
Painter of line detest his Colors? or lust all hordes?
Picasso’s stare more than a billion Miltons, an
Oath without a look the latter scrying Paradise.
For whom was lost, the valance gained, to ink
It such, remote from touch, no saint but painéd
To God’s ain’ts, promote a febrile vision.
A gentleman of lofty disposition, querulous or
Out of sorts, hostility of Trumpist with the Courts,
No randy, King James crisp but handy-dandy.
MEETING
12—13 chairs face idle inward in a shabby room, small candle
In a crystal base. In time’s measure 9 strengthen toward center
As usual incomplete. The gathered observe dark and day, that
Flicker somehow north of futile. Sweet cliché emerges from an
Open sweeter lass I briefly covet: ‘so grateful to be given quiet
In a hectic week.’ Off center further intrudes: Then Why must
She interrupt it? Eyes mine focus on the candle again there-in.
Where are we going less than tomorrow? What can she reach?
To teach her sorrow? Where is the center within the sin? What
Has she been? Even the knife that cuts a smile? Latter is thin?
Or other? Prim? My left calf aches. They break. It is 11 AM;
Chill First-Day morning in the Holy city. Lass was SO pretty!
SEVENTEEN
Has this scribbler strayed too far? Suffice that
Victims in the wings are thusly treated, their id
Kids seated in the media shooter-throne till all
Attempts at ‘justice’ are employed, a Holy City
Decently employed that poet can forgo odd ill
Pronouncement. In abstract one can opine an
Odd revenge, 365 times rampant beverage or 1
Rude stroke to quell all corporate pain no idle
Leverage or announcement. Invite the stranger
In, refrain from grin, the danger’s dun, uncertain.
EIGHTEEN
Every church 10 million saved is savvy for the
Kitty. All types all brands for sanctified or one
Night stands the steeples scratch an ambient air
Or dance constricted in the ample lair a Buddhist
Mantra, Baptist Split, Lutheran, Brethren, Holy
Skit, denominations gone but never quit, from
Sermon hymnal, Popish chatter for bless those
Gaunt or simply fatter, the vapid, sharp the curt
The saved, or gravid graved or prompt serene
All idiom grateful in between—the Holy City!
NINETEEN
The house is past a hundred, we not far behind.
Through most of that I’ve hungered, the recent
Less unkind. Imagine that today I am befriended.
Mentor perhaps to genius [or sense its hover].
Future looms in semaphore. Had known the
Whore & paid the dues, no Pulitzer no august
Nomination-hesitations lurching at the Muse
But here Gott struck far past facility or grope.
An anapest and juice, dactylic cipher, trochaic
Writher toward iamb—with Gene must say I Am.
TWENTY
I hate to kill the promise of a poem that lasts
Forever, but have pushed my luck to write at
78. In every TV ad the senior wench is tending
Flowers while her mate clips bonds. ‘Tis well advised
I find a suitable occupation or a date. The latter
Needs be well-assisted blond from sleek to Vamp.
Unadorned and often absent frames that might depress,
Mammary swell discrete and not foreboding, goading an
Apt investment, prudent medication stout bouffant.
Could blossoms never wilt? My wince or taunt?
THE GOAT
31 inches from the crimson udders of a primitive black goat, I
Focused on this painting at my progress into Hell, distended
Butt-cheek, pairs of flasks, jugs breasts, the latter crimson tips
That flare above belly, pubis, legs’ juncture a wide pale swath,
Face featureless silhouette, her left attendant lady’s head and
Javanese vase, willfully clumsy tilt, all in fact coupled, shock
To my Gestalt in 1962. So friendly are they now, the pairs, an
Odd wide warmth rendered tame in the current ethos. Hopper
James not Edward yet, wed my Hugely elder sister who fled a
Fiery start toward Hausfrau in Tucson, on 27 medications, her
Litany of ailments, children dispersed toward similar ill measure,
Treasure of regret their set and setting mercilessly correct.
TWENTY-ONE
What prompts this child to write again? You’d
Greet such dogged effort with a grin? Or find a
Smile, look past your shoulder? Enable Rumi to
Loft his boulder? Induce a reader clap or list a
Grievance? Or ragged, strut, as penance smut a
Sacred journey, no softy clamor, diamond, amber?
The glitter bitter, ambience fitter, a smack of wine,
A rudimentary vintage, humbly choice, rejoiced if
Wriggled on the vine, an appetite of graced but
Stout, derived from affirmation, chased by Doubt.
TWENTY-TWO
Greet such dogged effort with a yelp? Find even
Larger soul at best regaled? THIS scribble ‘tis
Fur and spit itself? A wealth of health a surge of
Wisdom? One cannot judge till we’ve kissed ‘m?
Take it as Einstein at his violin? Bailing a boat?
Ignoring Billy Graham? Repenting Cheers for
Lost or Silly, inciting Brothers in their cups to
Philly? Scratching sly sinner with a ruddy filet?
Blistering Sister? What ere it takes Ignore? When
Head of State is buckling under to his whore?
.
TWENTY-THREE
I hear a crash; she’s fiddling with a roach? This
Windless city has it thoroughly ‘palmetto,’ for a
Euphemism. I’ll grant you even huge they’re not
A tree [I googled it] from psalm to palm, in unser
Ghetto. Our Nelly doesn’t scold just chews them
Out; they’re minus legs if larger than my thumb,
Assessing the cadaver. Smaller of the North are
Found in hordes, these singular, averse to pack
Or crowd. I’ve turned them up and down quite
Dead inspiring awe, chagrin, plump or Sjogren’s.
TWENTY-FOUR
Such maladies entrappéd my stern sister, not so
Nelly. The latter’s youngish, fit and longing for
A fracas thus far she’s graced us. Sweeter, simpler
Than a clover, inhaling trace, cadaver, pinching
Catnip vermin, from which she’ll burst headlong
Through the flat, asserting that she’s feline, no
Ante omen. ‘Tis such not random, phantom, oddly
Godly, mystic, septic. Sleeps often on her back,
So secured to comfort zone. Dead ahead speed
After aught, whatever usual homely handsome.
MORE HOPPER
Far to my left, beyond a lilac spread 2 sunsets vie for beauty, a
Quietly vertical diptych. Capture beyond simple color field
Verisimilitude, a voice against muted yellow siding, perhaps the
Final series of a life. Here blood implies no certain anguish. We
Lean on such, even thirst, willing, despite cruel odds genius in
End stop statement. Deem safely more of adjacent vegetation as
Given tender heightened calm, where lovely’s spattered in the
Tentative pale swath and drip. Never Nature this cold charmer.
The dominant chill grays, or subtle imploded shards of stricken
Color? Where has soul gone, if real, beyond? To portrait of his
Daughter facing? Jennifer: vacant eyes-grip-chair-broad-belt, or
Hyper-realistic slacks, rude dazzling splay of sunlit grandeur.
TWENTY-FIVE
Our prelude [Elly] passed at 21, left heart Hole
Barely sealing. Our current [Nelly] charts syllabus
Of feeling. Near-her is lesser than distraught, nips
Nonetheless the edges. I have known no mortal
Fur-friend’s quiet so endearing. To park at 3 AM
Her soft white belly at my toes, to thumb her nose
At odds she could be trampled, design arthritic
Stroke holistic charm no false alarm, purgation
Simply such, is much! A blessing to our modest
Gray-frame simple dwelling. Her nuzzle healing!
TWENTY-SIX
My dearest Elsbeth fake-fights her subtle kitty,
A practiced shift to routine edging toward the
Opposition. The Nell advances, leaps and nips
[Just fabric, tear like static], retreats or charges
Toward the kitchen, tumid tumble, evasive, all
Shift to flight an awesome sight quite unevolved
From terror. Braided rugs scatter, shift, upend,
Recoil; the silver rattles [stainless steel] a shudder,
Thrill, the latter Cat-or Mater’s Weal, a dish an
Avocado [peeled], Elisabeth’s redacted squeal.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Is there taste of such paradise in our constricted
World? Can shadow dancing of our Nelly lift or
Pace just how it’s curled? Can human kind escape
Its dreadful wisdom? Must mouth phrase curse
Before it’s blessed them? Nelly exists, a sudden
Fissure in on-rushing Fate? Does such odd beauty
Ever quite escape? Moment is such, a wealth, a
Scream. Endure your lot when dream’s obscene,
The now is massive in immortal measure. How
Else HER seconds swell such mortal treasure?
TWENTY-EIGHT
The sad perhaps can texture limitation, fouled bliss
Or kiss or holy. Letter such to leverage much &
Grant the whole transmuted wholly. Odd God?
I’d borrow word I’d dare to utter. All mortal is
Constricted in the greater Welt, inscribes a godly
Scripture in a fleshly fault, most wayward, inked
By Nelly’s Judas-Cain’s; who willed to conquer:
Conjure, stain. The melody wields age-old refrain:
All smile is fashioned by a twisted knife. Laugh
Endure through endless strife? Simply love her life?
NATRAJ
Faux brass Natraj, God-destruction dances in his wheel of
Fire above our clothes rack? while His sullen antipode Vid
[Collected IS his Word] bulks at the other end. Neither is
Antithesis beyond self-achieved, both believed, in the sum
Of God-creation; both counter all human limitation, both
Linked amity-to-the-four-young-deities-diagonal-there confronting
Hopper. Where Avedon’s idolatry fuses WIT in a nascent
State, clear-eyed open Grace, each face, beneath a frieze, a
Seize, a seminal mortal. Whose voice is given? Whose soul
Is riven? Who dwells AS origin and summit of Vid’s Life!
From whence the wife, the Muse the price? Procedure? Such is
Ambition free of leisure. Such is his evanescent holy treasure.
TWENTY-NINE
Love paradox, love poor-in-heart. Remand the
Rent before it’s dark. Confuse the issue. Snort a
Line. Afebrile notions? Cease, define. Trumpĩan
Mind is muddy gesture. Reduce all germs before
They fester. Virgin carrot IS the sanctioned hue?
From cheek to spread, it could be you. Wrap our
Leader in a mailéd fist. Wrap son of bitched &
Broadly Twist. ‘Tis FIRE and fury that he can’t
Resist. Chaucer? Pasteur? To pause to toss-or even
Fit her? Would sink our POTUS jam his Twitter.
THIRTY
God damn it aren’t we holy? Remove the scab,
Insert the Foley. The sanctuaries hold their own;
All prayer to God’s robust. Ash Wednesday’s
Forehead smudges have their lot; we’ve not
Forgot. The Ninja man is dancing free of cost,
The pastors suitable, discrete. Even the Buddha
Chimes; the rappers rhyme; the Citadel’s effete
And nudged toward Patriotic glory, salute Old
Gory. A Rumi here would stir a throng; a lass a
Thong endures the shores; all just gradation snores!
THIRTY-ONE
What hierarchy remands to certainty? What 3
In one what verity? Access the doubt in Hegel’s
Soul. Blast wind or solar on the lurch to coal?
Who’d scorch the cosmos, torch the whole; fit
Thesis? Cease Is? Dialectic hefts the boulder;
A carrot rules, a Donald builder. Our debt’s
Indebted–sullen-35 will lick the fundament of
Strumpet’s pride, will chew the hide: some billions
Deified. All Morgen rises, hooks its Cross; ALT
Welt’s a bounty; hail loss hail empty, tempest tossed!
THIRTY-TWO
What Gott’s name has such to do with Rumi?
‘Tis merely Rumination! Air your frustrations!
We’re past 300 lines. Searching for affirmation!
The means oft the end. I bend the quest?
Put Rumi to the test! A guttural leap deserves
Its pounce. From sanctity to curse my duty’s
Sound! I crucify no poet. As if I wouldn’t know
It? Ambition is a muddy lot; we slog [as said]
A marsh. As such fall out from perspiration,
Doubt, who succeed? From hex to sex they breed.
MEETING II
So much affirmed felt crippled in my shame. Reveal my
Darkness? Carcinogen? Scavenging despair? Ebony coffin
OF my heart. But must relinquish so-to-say all thought for
Fragile Nell. Nightly bathroom trip when I confront HER
On my chair? Open to an elder’s tremulous hand & touch.
Is such? Not much? I have shouted toward the Void. The
Empty pit betrayal. Starvation of a billion souls. Infants
Suckling dust. Christ sake? this blossom’s vastly overage,
Uprooted. Tormented Tree of Life? ‘In Adam’s Fall. We
Sinnèd All?’ Thrust Faith in fire to temper. I tamper? Or
Sleep? That rain today that weeps, having used my aid? Tell
Each and every: our Collective curse—God’s universe?
THIRTY-THREE
Had I means I’d vest it on the given blond,
The situation stormy? sadly pliant: wrest client,
Livelihood itself, property, the principally lily
Oddly purported old, that horny? GAVE all his
Digs, possessions for a sniff sub-navel, lavish
Title-august, meretricious, ideologically hungry
Prevarications, golden toilet revelations, godly
Pinkel-sink-hole-scrapers for a pair of youthful
Bladder-capers; gave holiness itself, disease, the
Cure, gave more, even less if squeezed, the tease.
THIRTY-FOUR
The contortions there seem hardly worth the
Effort. Dealing with such has taken half a planet?
But trust a soul who cannot endure a cat? I’ve
Met them. An allergy can part one’s way with
Most? Suspicious! Just trust a tortured landlord.
We went that route. Duffer suffered! I held him
Up to light to view his soul. Somehow it left
Him in control. I flushed his memory down the
Toilet. The scream was piercing. Am often bent
To borrow lend an ear. The torment deafening.
THIRTY-FIVE
The switchuation wormy? Sodly pliant: blest client,
Ear to fear. WHY piddle on the poor-in-heart,
Diddle the last to start, incarcerate the wounded?
My age-old clock’s not wounded. Christ sake,
It’s a Timex! Paid up front 40, Change. Within
The bounded can’t predict the diction; is such
With fiction, spare me critic, the effete; there
Are churches on this street, a synagogue or 3;
4 nuns a priest 10 hilly rollers, pregnant wives
And jogger-strollers, city’s Holy. And he hollers?
THIRTY-SIX
I’ve read the weekly Times included poem &
Soaked it into every verse that’s second rate;
Just beg me cursed not straight, am suitably
Opaque, no common scribbler. If poetry’s a
Current mess just get it off your chest, don’t
Count me even half of piss-and-moan, these
Things aren’t koans. Besides I’ve garnered My
Rejections. Just look at any usual stanza. We
Do our thing! This stuff matters! You’d rather
Reruns of Bonanza? You frigging Pansy!
NELL ADDENDA
Investigates my room? Arrives, the cat, in a blur and thunder,
Heedless beyond a will to sniff, even my keyboard, the tangled
Electronics which connect me to the planet. She is at the blind.
To scold would be unkind: thus far she lacks neurosis, even in
Omen. I have known few of such health in kitty kingdom. Snorts
Tums, an empty flask, prefects this servant of despair, as with
The rest, even as now she hides beneath beige spread, hoping to
Engage this poem. Claws at an emptied carton, approaches book
Shelf, sinks from sight, emerges with no mute effort at Heidegger,
Wedging past Harold Bloom’s ‘Anxiety of Influence.’ I admire her
Poesis. Oblivious to this author’s, she leaps to the hardwood, skirts
M Donoghue, self-portrait, 92, the solitary pastel of his existence.
THIRTY-SEVEN
I pass 360 lines with no coherent subject matter!
How current can you get? Perchance an ode
To Horace, even sadder? Relent your critique
They groom the adder. Cleopatra? Down the ladder.
Retire to J Joyce Such ipso ancient? Rhymes
Syllabic toward the center, skewed but patient,
Even manly Manley Hopkins? Died of TB he
Or hodgkin’s? The crater’s deep we’ve stuffed
His Muse; she’s not amused. Takes years to glean
Reaction, and now polite contrite & indirection!
THIRTY-EIGHT
I’ve darkened the local hothouse with rejection.
Skewed personal taste lent honest-bent infection;
Retreated from all celebrated norm, opened
My cans of worms to seed the platter, wrenched
Sense groped chance, but dodged the token
Winner: read widely ‘major’ wrought, even lesser
Sought, the fraught the humble. See how they
Rumble! Hadn’t acquired the stomach to endure
Such corn that passed for harvest. Neither pap
Nor Pope nor Marist. Lack spunk for cherished!
THIRTY-NINE
414 Sumter’s pushing for reprieve. Nelly cries,
Her Mater’s out; cat senses mad design. The
Stars are less aligned. Would they willingly
Resign to leave me stranded? Of course her
Master doesn’t matter. Nell has him lower on
The charts. Where upon the tasty snacks, or
Puddle of whipped cream, matron’s scent if
Time to slumber. She has his number. Old
Guy passes muster, nothing sacred. For who
Translates all gesture into Prayer, is every There!
FORTY
Dear Mahmud, Jesu, Christ, she’s back! Not
Simply there ‘tis back attack. A phantom of
Forget has just expired. Of course they’ll take
Their nap; the bed is crisp with linen supple
Scented from the dryer. If larger world’s adrift
Here’s heavenly couple. No gratitude there-is is
Sadly wasted. Humility is sweet sensation, a
Pampered life no hampered cerebration. Ach
JA, attend the rite; ‘tis almost subtle Night
A furry fiery, lean satori. 2 angels wield the story.
MEETING III
The window . . . ach ja ignore the window? Where fronds crepe
Myrtle now past another summit flick flecks of innocent petal
In wind gusts shower-laden beauty past the glass, now clear &
Milky column’s glare a quarter of the horizontal pane: endure a
Stubborn heart with antipode of grief, all bleed in pain. What IF
Is centered toward infected soul, what such? A stab of blue an
It-caress? No clinic diagnoses ill intent no gauge no unassuaged
Mortal gravitas no loss no termination—this summons: mid-July
A thrust of summer. Such Nell’s clamor ample grant with now!
Here in a Holy city I center briefly eternal bliss-evokéd pale
Cascade, now visible culmen of the column’s pair’s full shade
Alone apparent in a scattered motion. I eat beyond to satiation!
2018
David Swartz [D.A. Vid] born in 1939, lives in South Carolina. “David Swartz is a poet who shouts into the Void but who is heard perhaps only by God…” (E. Sokolovsky. “The Great Poet”. “Slovo\Word” #98).
