in the glow of dream, i see him -
a molecular god, gloriously enthroned,
high above my bloody Rhine,
exacting tolls from cell-laden barges,
sinking those who cannot pay.
or it's the other Guy,
more about punishment than profit,
trying to make out in the bloody clumps,
Rorschach phantoms of goats and sheep.
in the day, its just the man with the folder,
navigating fate with data,
and frowning, brow furrowed in calculations.
-what were the environmental influences that led to your, ahem, disease?
the analyst, the metaphorist,
the child in the garden wondering if the slug bait is food -
all swirls in a giddy motion.
-what the fuck are you talking about?
what locale does he mean, i think. what location?
in my demented head, my lovely head?
the place where mountain meets myth
and we are all doomed to Castorp's clinic,
lying under blankets,
trying to find air unsullied by the life below?
under blankets protecting us from an icy world?
or perhaps he means time -
the mythical past and destiny-laden future,
put on our toast with jam each morning to be gnawed,
should we be deluded enough to believe in the distinction
between breaking news and dithyrambic musings in mask,
all created to make us laugh, cry, or applaud?
the first poem i taught in a freshman class was Mithridates,
a king now before me adding up doses.
-what trace from cause to effect is your helpmate, doctor? and just how are these blind, less than microscopic bits choosing the enemy?
he does not look up at my unasked question.
-look at Prufrock, his secret voice then whispers.
though romantic and charmingly feckless, vulnerability is unacceptable.
we need a bazooka to the balls of the world as well as a well-aimed irony.
maybe, i think.
maybe Prufrock should have shoved a coffee spoon
up the bum of the female impersonator
he was wanting to woo
and stopped sticking his head under the waves without an air tank.
frankly, i'm confused.
but then i suppose,
in the course of Being,
i will be passed through by many fights not mine,
a ghost in their path.
Mithridates, took just a little poison and lived long.
but what if,
in the depth of those nighttime battles,
i stretch out one finger and touch the blood stream,
jet stream,
cloud and fire stream of the forces,
and sucked by this touch into their pushing, pulling, buffeting paths,
i just float in that pulse,
its rush a curious lullaby;
white noise to the mountain peak that will crumble in its own time,
under its own weight,
or in the force of its own reach. |