The Complete Poems of A R Ammons, Volume 2

by A. R. Ammons

  the sweetest crescent

  of filtertips,

  peppermint-striped straws

  sprinkled here and there,

  15and dances

  a foamplastic chip:

  what a relief: something

  new to wade in and think about.

  1974 (1986)

  A Priori

  The mountain great

  and chipmunk small

  play being seen:

  the first wins all:

  5when they play hide

  the chipmunk shines:

  the game defines

  the winning side.

  (1986)

  Reticulum of Indirection

  The thing

  about hope

  is there

  is never

  5any need

  for any

  if there

  is any

  and probably

  10no need

  to bother

  with any

  if there

  isn’t any.

  (1986)

  Inclinations

  In the time that

  was before

  us we were to be but in

  the time

  5to follow where will

  our zero touch down:

  the infinity

  of the incoming, then,

  ending in finitude,

  10our days and ways,

  was not

  infinite, but into the

  emptiness arising

  infinity can get lost,

  15infinity itself,

  so that infinity feels

  different, a losing not

  a finding place:

  becoming out

  20of an infinitely arising

  is not the same as

  going away

  with an infinite going away:

  that is of course if

  25time so far away doesn’t

  build itself into

  a curve and swing around

  (how large a nothingness

  we float the small

  30feather of possibility on)

  but why if it swings

  around should it swing

  around into us and if it

  does will it swing

  35around into all of us,

  will we all be here

  as before,

  brother to brother, mother

  to child,

  40father, son:

  I daresay that would be

  quite a coincidence

  and yet a hope so general

  coincidence takes on

  45the simplism and

  certainty of a sign:

  _________

  swinging around, in that

  it builds coming back into

  going away, is tantamount to

  50questioning infinity,

  going out going out no

  farther than it goes out:

  but there are infinitely

  turning infinities,

  55circles, figure-8’s,

  möbiuses:

  if we came back, though, &

  found the details all the

  same, would we be pleased,

  60would we just live our life

  again and never know we had

  known everyone and done

  everything before

  or would we

  65have the sneaking suspicion

  that this reminded us of

  something

  nearly forgotten:

  what would be the use of

  70doing it

  exactly the same again:

  and why do it

  if it is to be different

  but, as for agony, the same:

  75if soul or soulspace is

  neither created nor

  destroyed (and surely somewhere

  is a where

  creation and destruction

  80hardly, if at all, alter)

  then we have a

  different ball game:

  we’ll go on:

  but not particularly as

  85ourselves: the essential

  will go on, the essential

  us, perhaps, but, perhaps,

  so essential

  that when it picks up more

  90trappings

  the design of the clothes

  will be unlike, even offend,

  us:

  perhaps life does not relate

  95to its two big bluffy

  timeless zones: maybe, life is

  just for its seconds: one

  second you’re here on your

  surfboard or deathbed, or

  100flying through

  space toward the gorge-rock,

  and the next second you’re

  not here

  and there is absolutely no

  105durance before nor after you

  are here:

  that seems much more manageable:

  it cuts away so much and

  sharpens relevancies:

  110no use to dwell around befoggy

  about your possible birth

  or to linger on afterwards

  making definite

  arrangements for a comeback:

  115perhaps, though, there are

  really no instants, maybe

  they are illusory or they are

  nearsighted misreadings:

  maybe they are the edgy

  120subwork of a mere integral

  calculus we can’t quite swoop

  with:

  supposing there is somewhere

  in the local universe

  125something like a hurdle or

  crest, like a marker for the

  high jump, and, say, everything

  time and all stuff, breaks out

  over that crest

  130and we seem to be here merely

  as we turn through this

  active, unmarked scope:

  possible, of course, the

  crest itself could be

  135wavelike in motion, progressive

  about various phases of the

  universe and offering its

  uplift to whatever is around

  and ready:

  140is one, in other words,

  swept through by larger

  continuities in

  the brevities of one’s hours:

  we are probably not in a

  145rapids: if the universe is

  the flux, what would

  be the rocks:

  but motionwise our immediate

  universe could be like a

  150drop of water flicked up by

  the bursting rapids

  to fall back into tumultuous

  ongoing:

  the rise and fall could

  155nevertheless show the design

  of a singular (and departing)

  action, an excepting

  distinction seeks, an

  individuation exclusion prompts:

  160motions like meanings are

  subsumed and further subsumed:

  the arc of our frailty

  dismantles but

  other motions boil and swirl

  165us into other meanings:

  why are we so worried, as if

  we were in charge:

  are we to rely on the

  possibilities we can imagine:

  170we think we know everything

  because we think we know

  everything we know:

  but there may be spacious

  layouts we have no housings to

  175put in yet:

  you can put classicism inside

  romanticism but you can’t

  put romanticism inside classicism:

  we circle the holy, stand liths

  180(phallic cymbals) intervalled

  appropriately about shined

  through with kinds of seasonal

  ma
thematics with protectorate

  grooves and ledges further

  185outstanding, each marcato

  inwardly announcing intensification

  till the holy roar at

  the priestly center enchants

  solicits the skies, brings

  190down the rain or

  stirs the wind, beseechings

  pain trues like the lean

  a tree makes of the total

  winds: we get it right: we

  195screw and dream, we husband

  and rear, we win and hold,

  we beg forgiveness, we enact

  accuracy as supplication, we

  school precision till the polestar

  200sits in our beam, we rise

  too risen at times, we misjudge

  the low: all we want is what

  we want, touch, strength,

  we want lith and plinth,

  205penetralia, release:

  (the same place disturbs and eases)

  we beg forgiveness because what

  is there to beg for when you

  have everything except

  210forgiveness for having it

  the universe, empty as

  it is, might from far enough

  away look as solid as a man:

  our incarnation is blurry:

  215the fingertips end, plus or

  minus, in a fog, flakes and

  shedding shale, millions of

  organisms scrambling for

  space or hiding, furrows

  220like glacial lake-lines:

  more vaguely yet, we’re breath

  and broken wind, feces,

  moisture from mouths, eyes,

  ears, skin, scalings of teeth,

  225epithelial sheddings, eargum,

  eye cracklings, snot,

  germ-lively perspiration, all

  our byproducts, the incomings

  and outgoings wither and

  230spall our containing walls,

  my father said

  folks used to

  bean up overnight

  and gather the next

  235morning at the

  farting pole:

  each contestant

  grabbed

  hold of the pole,

  240cocked a leg, left or

  right, and split

  a tune, criteria

  running from pitch

  to volume to length

  245of announcement,

  slidings from

  keen whines to

  baritone bellows

  how long the world’s been here

  250while the myths like river

  systems or ocean currents or

  weather lows and highs migrate

  turning into and out of

  figurations having turning in common:

  255if, though (though, though,

  though) your current instants

  contain each a cry, each cry

  boxed, enflamed and wound out

  with screeching ribbons, knots gripping

  260centers or sheets checkered

  with disjunction, abrupt,

  pointed, opposite changes—

  why, then, oblivion may become

  paradise, expectation may not

  265involve streets and clothes,

  wagons and weddings, jobs and

  accruements but expectation

  may wear the look searching

  nothingness, a paradise golden

  270by rusty earth, the only

  way to lift the tumor out to

  let it no longer weigh:

  this time of year I stop every

  day by the forsythia, its gold

  275daily different from

  green to bronze to white gold

  and I stand still and say to

  myself, now, check this out:

  but the still pictures I take

  280erode from

  the mind and wash away

  whereas the things I move

  around without paying any

  attention to build up distally

  285into present-fresh permanences:

  odd how one thing holds to

  another’s motion:

  so they put all your boxes of

  instants into the box and

  290lower you away to a

  resting ground—this you will

  not feel, no stuffy nose, no

  crinklings, parts through the

  hair, no lip drifts, or eye

  295cross rolls: gravity will

  pull, bottoms will collect

  fluids while the tops become paper

  thin and musty crisp: but

  you will not need to object,

  300everything will use mannerly

  in the scheme of natural things:

  still, you’ll be a

  long time getting free of

  that much, that secure a

  305bondage, trying to keep the

  old once again preventing you

  from the liberal mixes and

  flows of being altogether free

  of the physical holding at

  310last:

  why not consider cremation

  and whiff away suddenly:

  except for the grieving ones

  confronting the spiritual blank

  315with no place to turn for you:

  let them have a stone (a

  phallic cymbal) noded with a

  granite-ring peak: let them

  have a mound, the mournful

  320displacement of the underground:

  give them weeds to pick and a

  place to set the flowers

  (someone may steal to another

  grave, no matter, try

  325artificials): was the person

  never a body, then, what we

  loved was an inhabitant not

  really confined in soil or

  lost in smoke but the unimaginable

  330quantity now returned a

  resource to its sources or

  those distal frames a few so

  clear buried in our brains,

  living in our body again, this

  335time ours: what was alive in

  other flesh lives on in us,

  the son carries the father,

  the other loss filling the son’s

  mind as grief: we are all

  340one person: if the universe

  could be seen far off it might

  be a man getting his tapes

  out to play his girl: the eye

  breaks down before our

  345insolidities: we roll universes

  within us when we rock:

  I do admire discursion’s air,

  the facts stripped flat,

  informational, no more alignment

  350practiced between them than

  practice requires, no honeyed

  energy surfeit anywhere, no

  glow in excess of limitations,

  leftover mizzlement: and

  355no theory working through,

  embranching and leafing till

  every cell works to the good

  of a trunk, till every bit of

  sky is brought into subservience,

  360the fully yielded image, at

  once its general and specific,

  the flame-work locked in,

  the prison of consistency,

  the tyranny of insistence:

  365oh, no, I do admire the

  slightness of reason that

  tunnels through a turbulence

  with only so much way as to

  make its way: surprise, then,

  370enriching possibility,

  swerve and swell befall, the

  worm’s interest in the tree,

  boring:

  explaining’s inexhaustible

  375(nothing having yet been

  explained) but explaining in

  every t
ime wears a different

  cast which is explaining

  enough, the tone, the air,

  380the slant, the character:

  then, too: the definitional

  can keep you going while a

  focus brought on by totality

  of apprehension leaves you

  385struck, nodding off: but

  inexhaustibility inexhaustibly

  enough comes on with concrete

  ridges, streaks of peaks,

  real ravines edgy with brush

  390and sharp here and there where

  washes or falls scour wear

  away:

  discursion allows

  speaking at large as small

  395speaking: dwell here or there on a

  twig-end, what’s lost, tomorrow’s

  twig can be different, a variety

  spaced on the other side of the scope:

  whereas

  400large speaking that just

  rises up into mist over the midst

  has no underbottom precision works:

  where,

  for example, can the

  405sidewinder sidewind or the rattler

  rattle, or the stream stream

  if not in the actual

  and yet, to tell the truth,

  I’m not sure it isn’t the

  410propositional that survives:

  Emerson makes spare rhymed (ribbed?)

  or unrhymed metrical contrivances

  that say something interesting,

  whereas

  415some people’s quartz contentment

  or masted Mannahatta, forget

  such dark impasses:

  (art turns on itself and ends

  inexhaustibly in

  420turning endlessness)

  1985 (1987)

  Why Is It Always the Way It Always Is

  Things are so temporary, change so imminent, there’s no use

  to get angry: if your kid washes a month of mud from under

  the fenders and it slickens your driveway and your boots with

  every drizzle, don’t get upset: first thing you know, your child will be

  5elsewhere not a child, as if wild weather had twisted through, leaving

  you no precious world: and the mud could (slightly) build

  up your flower borders or introduce a color variation into the blooms:

  who knows where fender mud comes from, a vacation trip, a lovers’