The Complete Poems of A R Ammons, Volume 1
Page 23
as if
waiting for a mt to
dissolve:
4590or for a burnt woods
to make
cones and acorns:
just north of here’s
the pine-barrens—maybe
459530 × 50 miles:
hasn’t been underwater
since the Miocene,
when it was an
island: has a
4600fern
found
nowhere else in the world:
and a fox there
has a modified kidney:
4605all around deciduous
forests
took over the rising land
so that’s why
the barrens
4610is still an island
(botanical):
our woods, mostly
scrub oak
& pine,
4615have three levels:
the lowgrowth of
floor shrubs:
then laurel,
Quercus marylandicus, and
4620tall shrubs:
then oak & pine:
pine used to be
dominant here: but
when pine is cut
4625oak takes its place:
when oak is burned
over, it
sprouts,
five- and six-trunked:
4630determined:
one day last summer I was
driving long the road
over by Gravelly Run and I
seen this turtle
4635just going
in the bushes: so
I stopped (because my
nephew loves ’em)
and when I stooped to pick
4640up the turtle,
I seen a sight: his back
was hazy with
mosquitoes, thick
as they could
4645stick,
bumming a, now mind you,
ride on a turtle’s back!
saving their wings
& certain
4650sometime they’d be
brought to water:
didn’t see anything
like that in NY:
economy, full use
4655of possibility:
(if you were
sitting on a
distant strand,
longing for home,
4660you’d have to
conjure up things to
occupy the time,
too)
9:15 pm:
4665but is it
possible to
talk the chaff
away? can
windy vowels
4670brush off all the bits of
paper
& leave a clean place for
the simple design?
screens
4675between us & memories
we can’t bear:
what unmentionables
of guilt & terror!
go back & see
4680terror as fantasy,
guilt as innocence?
but we’ve
purposely lost
the road back:
4685take it on
faith
we knew no better
then, did the best we
could,
4690& are repentant
for wrongs
imagined or real:
instinct protects us:
let’s accept this
4695provided & open
possibility & go
ahead:
we may redeem ourselves:
feelings, troublesome,
4700volcanic:
disturbances held
down, deep as control
can reach:
should we let go a little?
4705is it our fear of feeling
& not feeling itself
that pours concrete slabs
across our lives?
can we open a valve
4710& let ourselves go
flat like a tire?
or must we have that
pressure for our riding?
11:15 pm: my wife says if
4715you put soft
cookies with
crisp cookies the
crisp cookies turn soft:
bad apples with
4720good apples: bad
potatoes with good
potatoes:
(2nd Law Thrmdnmcs)
soilage spreads
4725&
nature is trying to get
everything back
into the mill:
we exist because we’re
4730afire (& burning out):
31 DEC:
today the dry burn in
my nose of a cold
coming on:
I should have known:
4735that bus back
from NY the
other night
had no heat—I’d put my
coat in the rack—and the
4740guy beside me fell asleep:
(he woke up in pain:
had had a few
beers
before boarding the bus—
4745said
they were the longest miles
he’d ever ridden: express,
sir, we don’t make
stops)
4750little girl ahead of me
kept trying to push her
seat back, hitting me
in the long-legged
knees:
4755she waited till I seemed
asleep: then, ram! wow:
people:
her mother, beside her
in the aisle seat, was
4760rather attractive:
scratched her daughter’s
head: daughter said, that
feels good: & scratched
her mother’s head:
4765(grooming: no lice
to pop in teeth as
reward)
energy transformations:
how do
4770porkchops make
my body turn?
energy, conserved, weaves
in & out (perhaps not
as a
4775separation—structure
& function
are
inextricably
intertwined) is
4780stored, released,
transformed—
still continuum:
what is the
subcellular machine
4785in the eye that
converts
radiant to electrical
energy?
in the chloroplast,
4790radiant to chemical
energy?
how do fireflies
turn
chemical into
4795radiant energy?
the nerve,
chemical
into electrical energy?
mechanisms: necessary
4800exchanges:
worked out & perfected
(proved
practical) long
before we stood
4805by the shores of
incredibly ancient sea:
if we looked only by
what we know,
we couldn’t turn our
4810heads:
if we were at the
mercy of what
we understand,
our eyes couldn’t see:
4815discovery is
praise &
understanding is
celebration:
but understanding
4820is to see itself
fallen short:
our proud words
(that possibly
tear & defame what
4825is)—why
we don’t know
how porkchops
give us the mouth!
but speech
4830potential was
<
br /> there
& we realized it: we
speak:
cabbage
4835releases energy in us
that trembles
our vocal cords
to tangle with air
& give it shape!
4840Lord, I’m in your
hands: I surrender:
it’s your will
& not mine:
you give me
4845singing shape
& you turn me to dust:
undefined &
indefinable, you’re
beyond reach:
4850what form should my
praise take?
this long thin
song?
to be
4855simply & completely
human?
to unite
everything that has
been made
4860with
tenderness?
we’ve made
miracles of our own!
spaceships
4865abstract as the laws of
motion:
the pure design of
wooden bowls:
wonders & matters
4870of fact: but
where did everything that
is
come from?
while we can’t
4875understand, we can
feel
and
that’s a fine essence,
astonishing as the
4880mitochondrion—
if
not
more
so:
4885leave structure
to the Maker
& praise
by functioning:
1:26 pm:
4890I feel a little
shivery:
the cold’s making—
forgive me—headway:
but I just had a baked ham
4895sandwich, glass of milk &
coffee,
that to be
transformed into
whatever ammunition
4900it can:
after this,
this long poem, I hope I
can do short rich hard
lyrics: lines
4905that can incubate
slowly
then fall into
symmetrical tangles:
lines that can be
4910gone over (and over)
till they sing with
pre-established rightness:
here, I plug on:
whatever the Muse
4915gives, I release
for
this is one possible kind
of song
& has one kind of veracity:
4920I’ve been
looking for a level
of language
that could take in all
kinds of matter
4925& move easily with
light or heavy burden:
a level
that could,
without fracturing, rise
4930& fall
with conception &
intensity:
not be completely
outfaced
4935by the prosaic
& not be inadequate
to the surges:
I’ve hated at times the
self-conscious POEM:
4940I’ve wanted to bend
more, burrowing
with flexible path
into the common life
& commonplace:
4945the denominator
here may be too low: the
lines may be
too light, the song
too hard to hear:
4950still, it’s not been
easy: it’s
cost me plenty:
last day of the year:
I’ve been at this
495525 days—this
idle tendance
of typewriter & Muse—
nearly a month of Sundays:
I’ll miss the
4960hovering over time,
the watchfulness—an idea
about to take hold,
an image reach for shape:
I’ll miss the
4965gathering up into days:
but not all art runs
along: it sometimes
stands by,
selects, stores,
4970alters,
hardens till
like a boulder it
nearly halts the running on:
I anticipate: the
4975empty tape is still
imposing,
frightening:
the unconscious will
have to act out
4980several more shows
before the marginal red
ink
warns it’s time
for a new tape:
4985poetry has
one subject, impermanence,
which it presents
with as much permanence as
possible:
4990the moon was I suppose full
last night:
it cast exact shadows:
9 degrees this morning
with the highest
4995atmospheric pressure
recorded since 1927:
something like 30.82
and mostly sunny
today:
5000clabbering up now
(3:50) though:
thank it’s agonna snow
some:
don’t keer if it do:
5005memories, tapestries:
a huge
wild cherry tree
grew
in the bank
5010of the old deep ditch
that cut
all across the farm
from road to swamp:
field-tree, shady
5015& cool: big roots, turned
gnarled as bark,
stuck out deep down,
dark
with damp:
5020vines o vines
running here & there all
over the place tangling—
jasmine vines or some
kind of honeysuckle
5025(not the shrub honeysuckle
of open woods)
but deep down in the
ditch, crawled into,
an opening, cool,
5030vineless,
with somber trickle of
clear water:
that’s where I used to
find the
5035diamondback
turtle: yellow stars on
black shell: cool &
mysterious,
with ruddy-yellow spotted
5040mouth: a hold of
wildness
leaping in the veins—
like a fountain, or,
prolonged, excitement
5045moderate & lingering
as a spring
oozing into the ditch:
a full tree, alone,
that took on space far &
5050high as it could reach:
corn wdn’t grow
anywhere around:
would yellow,
shrivel, never come
5055to tassel:
that’s why
one May
we girdled
the tree, a narrow
5060belt of white meat
showing and then
the old heavy branches
lightened
and all the stiff
5065fingers
pierced black pleas
into the empty sky:
in my memory all is
white with blossom: the
5070ground is
purple with
blackcherry stain:
and green
leaves hold
5075way up into the day
an oasis of cool,
settling air:
/>
the turtle swims
in my hand:
5080water nearly declares its
running on:
times so far gone: a
new nakedness
at the ends of rows:
5085a new nakedness
of need:
how can these
pictures stay
in my head:
5090how, after lying 30
yrs in darkness, can
they be brought up,
looked at, and
resubstantiated?
5095what we don’t
know’s a scare:
& comfort:
how could we react
if we heard the machinery
5100of our reactions?
there is a silence
in us:
here
I
5105will
make
room
for
more:
5110the record the surf leaves
on the shore
relates tenuously to
any given wave
yet is an exact
5115history:
I can’t hear
all the waves
lapping
back in my life
5120still
there’s a song
running through,
wanting to come out here:
country darkness:
5125no street-corner light:
a yellow kerosene
lamp
across the fields, blown
out:
5130stars
in an uncompromised
clarity
rush into, dusting
the heavens:
5135see that?
where?
over there—cat-eyes:
two little stars:
look at that
5140luminous dust,
the thick axis of the
galaxy:
on
this cool
5145sandpath
I’m experiencing
the galaxy?
human concern in
country darkness is
5150narrow
& short of range
in a wide
rangeless house!
1 JAN:
raining:
5155at the borderline &
promise
of snow:
gale warnings up