Black Tulip, again!

For all my suffering, my journey into the blood life:

 Black Tulip

I have always kept you, sweet rind,
Covered you in the cloak you gave to me,
Making me invisible, and blind,
To everything I should see.
But in the agony of my body,
Handing me a black tulip when I held a rose,
And didn’t even feel the thorns,
The thorns that would dispose my blood
To the air, and I could not even feel,
In this agony I threw away the rose.
Because I did not understand it did not see,
The impression of my body, my seed, the black,
Decaying to take me, back to what I could not see.

 I have my hand displayed outside a car window,
And amid all the rind’s perfect turbulations,
The laughter of a breeze, the echo of what I see.
I’ll hold the core in my hand, because I have seen it,
Decay. I have seen my own face fade away. And when
 I used to display death as a black flag, oh me, it is life,
Life’s greatest lover and friend, It is that bend in the road,
I do not want to see. For I have fallen into deepest black.
I do not want to come back. I have seen the wind. I have
Seen the rain breathe. I cannot achieve eternity or space,
In the concept of what I dream, but oh I can dream that
Eternity and space are more than distant relatives,
Catching a conversation after too much silence
And yet committed to the silent vow: I do not make a vow to you.
You will break me apart into a prism, and circulate my colors
To eyes that will not see, too stuck on the rind, to ever know,
The nature of invisibility. But I do love you, more than rind ever knew.

 You took my body and made it a soul,
You gave me the black tulip, and I did not hold back.
You wear no mask, you are no vision, but what I am is your vision,
You know all visions break apart, circulate, and die.

 But you are my blood, and I see you more than rind ever knew.
And I cannot be but to stay true, to the life that isn’t me,
 To rise in the bevy of sunset, and discard my cloak,
And let my nakedness feel the blood of a dead rose,
Mourning without veil, the sound of black,
The color of white, the blood, the dead attack.

The execution of Federico Garcia Lorca

I am drawn to Lorca's lecture on "duende." I've just been experiencing it. And (I) wrote this poem, as an homage to him, over the weekend. Of course, he deserves much better than my pen. Rooted deep in the earth, where what births us brings us to our end. But, he is by far my greatest influence. And I only wanted to capture that moment, in 1936, during The Spanish Civil War, when the horrid Fascists executed him, point blank, reportedly beside a matador and school teacher (also executed). For a man who said Dali found "eternity with limits," I must say, Lorca, your eternity was too beautiful to traverse time:

 The Execution of Federico Garcia Lorca

 The refuge was washed in your blood,
Dead volcano, dead church,
 And for everything that hummed in the silence,
You did not give word.
A Cypress branch
At dawn. The sun.
Mystical reaper with its eyes shut.
Take my body, oh, but never a thousand violins!

 I cannot hear the tears, and think my well is dry.
 And in the mirror of my eye,
I find everything sharp and shattered.
And wonder, why, did I, escape the pool,
That granted me my face,
And gave beauty a mountain?
Is this the dream I must erase?
 Lay down your gun, give the gun disgrace,
But, oh, don’t disgrace me!

 I hear a thousand violins
And oh, they are silent.
Traveling to mountain
And sea. And Andalusia. Just to taste, I see.
But where will the embrace go,
If it cannot carry me?

The lullaby. I need to go where I cannot see,
But oh, the terror, is overwhelming me!
So many, so many, are watching me.
Even as they cannot see.
My body will be a dead church,
My ghost a dead volcano.

 Yet somehow, I must march beyond the birth,
The blood, the breathing, the moaning pain.
And find a morning in its deepest rain.
And see I was not a dream in vain,
Because all dreams are painters,
And we the stealers of their brush,
Even in the lush fog.

 Will my body erase you, mountain?
Or will I erase you, sea?
 I give the brush back to you,
And go, where even summer, cannot dream.

No frater ave atque vale

I do forgive not having posted in quite some time. I've been ill. But, expect poetry rife with my approximations of beauty, soul, and mind. Some of which will befit my status as Jewel of the NIL! If Flannery O'Connor wrote through SLE, so I must (too).

Sum (COGITO ERGO)?

I wrote the following poem yesterday... more a poetic effusion, than poem. I've called it Sum, because it is, in many ways, the sum of me, and if you pursue the Latin root of the word Sum, it is a verb "To Be." Hence, Cogito Ergo Sum... (I think therefore I am)... now that I read it again, in its entirely unfinished form, I realize, the mood I'm setting isn't one of happiness or despair. It's more the "I am; to be" of a resilient soul, a rose, who will take the attacking rain, which is the quintessential embodiment of life, and death, and rather than let it dissipate, into the grass. It catches a drop, of this medal of air and the absent sun. What I must signify is the fact that the rose and the absent sun, in this poem, share the burden of being nailed, much like the rood. They die for life, that is. Because life and death are nothing if not landscapes that mimic each other, are endemic to each other, in everything but temptation. I've been in quite the fight as of late. Physically, with my Lupus... which not only has affected my kidneys (since 2005), but is now, more than likely, affecting my brain. I suppose I feel like the rose, because I'm constantly attacked, by a reality that wants nothing but suffering (for me). Like the rose, though, I take that little bit of without, a piece of the evil that pelts me, and keep it close. Within. To feel my fire, my fallen light, my flight into some apotheosis. And, if I can say anything here, it's this: we are always given burdens we cannot bear. It is only when we pursue the dream of bearing, not just bearing, but fighting them that despair becomes less and more prominent. It seems so many poets and artists are trying to reconcile an Eden with reality. But, my belief is that pain precedes Eden. It is only from sorrow, as Oscar said, "where there is sorrow there is holy ground," and Goethe implied, it is only from sorrow that our wellspring erupts. And we can dream on the clear water of a stream that seems to carry nothing, but really enhances everything we've ever lost. Maybe even (what we) never had. Basically, we pretend to invent a future from a past we'd rather prevent. And we manipulate this future into being a past. I, through all the pain I've been experiencing as of late, believe in something of the earth, endemic, primal... and this is to where I must go back. To distill the "eternal from the transitory," as Baudelaire thought one should, and feel an essence of something that may be a chimera, yes. But I keep the chimera's source (stronger,) when I enclose it in my petals. We are all primal, but it is always possible to take the wind, the rain, the sun and moon, and find in all its beauty and brutality, brutalities of our own making. Ones that we can enhance, an ugliness we can shape, into truth... that is... "eternity with limits"... transcendent measurements:

SUM
The rain escapes a modest cloud,
Trampling wildflowers, grass
With its medals of air, and gold
Extracted from the absent sun.
And one rose, it falls upon,
Assaulting the white petals
Until they turn a deep red
And the rose wishes it were dead,
This rose captures a drop,
Keeps it hidden in the fibers
Of its bleeding petals, for it knows.
The absent sun is better gone
When its lips and throat and tongue
Are parched, than when, already sunk
In this water, all the warmth is drunk,
And these medals of air, and gold
Are only nailing its tissued mold.
Every drop is another nail,
A wealth of medal from the white sky,
The modest cloud dissipates,
The rain has nailed its perfect rose
Into a perfect rood, gone into its roots,
Has mauled its bed, has given it
Not the comfort of being dead
But the task of knowing death
Is life, and both, assault and retreat
And are given back to the absent sun.
But this rose will not give back its drop,
It keeps it couched in its fibers,
Tastes the water dissipating, becoming part
Of it, part of the blood, the fight,
The falling flight, now fallen light,
For this rose will see, beyond day and night
Beyond the demarcations of root and air,
Rood and blood, its tissued mold against the sun:
And be, as it were, the echo, in a forest of mirrors,
Reflecting back and forth the reflection
Of a faceless crowd of a thousand suns,
Reflecting, in despair, the refraction of no one.

The Rood and the Thorn

This is dedicated to everyone, who was, under the assumption the world would end, today. Also, after listening to all of Chopin's nocturnes, early this afternoon, both his Piano Concertos, Liszt's Un Sospiro, Stravinksy's Firebird, I must say, I think a colossal sigh came over the world. Thanks to Liszt! Expect a poem on Rusalka... me embodying Rusalka... dedicated to (Dvorak) tomorrow. And bear with me, in my wondering if Delacroix really said Malibran was catering to the masses who had no artistic taste?! I love Delacroix, but I would also love to take a "time machine" and see Malibran, and her sister, Pauline (Viardot), perform. Forgive my not having any "profound" ramblings. Things have been rather horrid, today, despite my immersion into beauty, and the subsequent intoxication. Remember, we are all Phoenixes, but we go to different fires. And, despite beauty's intoxication, I've been feeling horrid... more so at the moment, with this execrable stomach pain, and, what I hope isn't bronchitis, or, Sol forbid, Pneumonia! *With the CellCept that would certainly kill, or do a number, on me!* Do not pray, but sing, for me. And I will prevent the day's arrival, the night's arrival, so death can find its perfect breath, a sigh, if you will, from what was being forsaken, taken, by what we "expect" :

THE ROOD AND THE THORN
Await the lark, and see,
For every cloud that bleeds
No consolation in the dark,
And rip apart, the black ivy.

Forget the lily opened white,
And didn’t want any hue
Save a clear stream of water,
Without any shade of light,

Color of Cypress, and its root,
Apple untouched but craving soot
The blood delivers from the rood,
But there is no flesh to make it true.

There was no lark when lily grew,
And no frost upon the sleepy grass
Or dead volcanoes erupting: the pass,
Of deepest night unto its death,

Annihilation of the ghost, the breath,
The birds sit in their morning pews
And do not mourn their brood,
But sing to praise of flesh and youth,

And I know what you will never see,
To rip apart the black ivy, the white lily,
The clear stream of water,
Without any shade of light,

Is to take the blood from the rood,
What seems to you the morning’s light?
And turn it into fresh laid snow,
Where roses bleat, but thorns won’t grow.

A poem, dedicated to Bunbury

I realize it's been quite some time, since I've posted. I'll admit I have been in horrific states. But, this morning, circa 5 am, I woke, looked out a window, and saw my dogwood tree, full bloom. White blossoms, illuminating the shadows that foregrounded it. And, of course, this image incited me to write a poem, which I am dedicating to Bunbury:

DOGWOOD TREE

Your white flowers exemplify shadow,
Reaching towards me from the bushes
Who are green but seem of deepest black,
To break from night and take the daylight back.

But you, a haven of phosphoric blue,
Dotting the sky when night is most profound
Helped lost sailors hope, when none was found,
Blossomed, to be rooted, from tip to ground.

The rain falls, in a small swell of petals,
It breaks against those shores that are distant
And yet, so close, the earth and the ash,
Your flowers bob, and petals clash.

Better than gloaming, grooming the past,
To move into a future, and wear its cape
Blacker than the night sky, your escape,
Of rain, wiping tears, from the wind’s cry.

Putting its sorrow back in the earth,
The sorrow that a farrow cow won’t feel
But embodies, to ever dream of a new calf,
Is nothing, if not, that dreaming lasts.

Your white flowers recede into daylight,
And I mourn that their light must pass
Unless another night comes, another dawn,
But when air gives root, my dreams, are gone.




*Expect some ramblings, reader(s)?, from me in the upcoming weeks. I have not vanished. Baudelaire wrote, in relation to genius the public is like a slow running clock. (This was in an essay on E. Delacroix). I've been thinking how true this is, particularly in contemporaneity. I'd never declare myself a genius, I am not one, however, it seems the aristocratic population is diminishing. We must work to sustain the blood line! C'est Moi? The Jewel of the NIL!*

FRATER AVE ATQUE VALE

...I wanted to take the sky at night
And wrap its stars around my finger,
And pretend I were wed to their light
Always on the cusp of decaying;
But the stars never told me
The night was their muslin, worn
As a shroud, to mourn
Their projection; into the space
My eyes erased, by turning it
Into a place of my own...

These lines above, from the beginning of a poem I wrote recently, called OSIER, perfectly embody me. In his salute to Dali, poetically, Lorca lauded Dali's penchant for seeking "eternity with limits." When Baudelaire wrote of the concept of beauty, he noted in modernity an artist must "distill the eternal from the transitory." It seems, I have come to the realization, that finding my own expectations in the transcendent, the eternal, has led me astray, to where everything is NIL. Mind you, I do believe the entities of beauty, truth, art, and love are valueless, things to which we ascribe substance via imitation. By imitation I'm affirming nothing is the root of everything, of DASEIN, of becoming... but this isn't a nothing to which nothing can be had... it is capable, it is culpable, its invention is ascribed within, via instinct. An instinct that is inspired, not by transcendence, but the material(s) without we so often -perfectly- ignore. The transitory, if you will.
I'm woven into this poem as if it were an Osier, because I enhance, in these first lines, the fact that my mistake is in trying to find transcendence in something already infinite. So the stars wear a shroud. They mourn the space I erase, by turning it into a place of my own. A place of the finite. I'm, in fact, distilling the transitory from the eternal, probably the one mistake we all make, the mistake, which leads us irreparably astray.
I'm beginning to feel the dialogic nature of everything. Those little things I encounter, especially... the earth, the dirt... the sun, the moon... the wind, the sky... we're always in a conversation, much like literature converses historically, so what we encounter, "naturally," is a palimpsest. A past from which we're thrust, to which we change, and adapt into a future that may seem singular, but is really inscribed with that strain of love, according to an excerpt from a Spanish lullaby I read, that clear water carries, long past, and left unsaid.
It's strange to think we must treat the past as we do our blood. Something that is endemic, yes, but also inscribed with layers of experience, history, etc., which we make alien by forsaking, for the future's burden. So we are thrust by it, yes, but we re-invent it, to re-discover a future that has actually already been inscribed, by our need for creation. I used to speak of the re-creative capacities of art, Joyce's Ulysses, beginning with an "s"... Stately Plump Buck Mulligan... and ending with an "s"... Molly Bloom's inimitable "YES!"... was always a signifier, alongside his use of stream of consciousness, that everything was a matter of re-invention, re-creation, "the ineluctable modality of form."
Now I see this is somewhat true, yes, and it perfectly defines the trajectory of the novel. But I believe humans are a combination of the novel and the epic. We are always on the cusp of creation, which is really re-creation when intertext is taken into account, but then recoils on an inheritance we all have. To which we speak; it's when the world- the earth, the dirt, the word- speaks back, when we see the transmutation of infinity in the concepts we define, that any epiphany or artistic process can be had. Hence art requiring both instinct and the critical capacity, to which instinct is always a predecessor.
I've been gone for quite some time, hence my frater ave atque vale (Hail brother and farewell)! I've been in horrid states. My soul has been destroyed. My body equally harmed... and all I can ever come to imagine has amounted to NIL... whether by manipulation of me or something extraneous, I do not know. What I do know is there's so much more beauty to the hidden path, the one that destroys you, until you realize you are not the Phoenix, but the fire that kills and re-births it... it's when you are deconstructed, destroyed, torn apart, that you come to find there IS an instinct, there IS a core...and it is something to be cherished, it is where form finds its fluidity, to perfectly enhance and define (by) its own constructs... its own confines.
Sadly, for me, my core is precarious, something that can be torn out, so I feel half here. A mirage of a ghost. Any poetic endeavor henceforth will be an attempt to recollect it, so it becomes a familiar room, a familiar mirror that I can look upon, and see ME staring back.
I believe I must go to the dirt, to the root, to the wind, to the rain, to the sun and moon, to find, we're all tragic and doomed, but it is our ability to groom this tragedy into a comedy that makes us wise, and gives us grace. Some would say this is our destiny, I only say it's the space we erase to come up with our own version of place. I may have an epic inheritance, but my novel manipulation of it... well,there you have the rub!