The Complete Poems of A R Ammons, Volume 1

by A. R. Ammons

  death secures us from

  death, words slug for our redemption

  always a swing and a miss, meanwhile

  it’s balls & bacon as usual, conception

  7050and decay, laughter and tears,

  the explosive, incredible mix

  Snow

  Snowwons

  mons

  since we must die,

  7055sweet completeness will

  not have us wait in attendance

  on our bodies

  while workers fatten

  and disperse and find

  7060slick tunnels to

  flight and the rich (or poor)

  man’s table,

  while roots explore the

  forehead and settle in the

  7065ears, while the burrowing

  beetle swims through or

  around the eye (like a planet)

  while the water rises and

  the body log

  7070spins, the bottom-gazing

  face: how, I mean,

  nice that though we know this

  we need not witness the

  knowing of this

  7075life, that can be death

  enough, that we need

  and know, so that as we

  enter into death we slip

  out of it

  7080like wrapping off the

  chocolate:

  wooden boxes eventually “give,”

  the rain finds a hole and bores

  through, milling the bones and mound

  7085gravel: on such a day of happenings,

  those who love go here and there

  four days of clouds, two days

  of rain, the temperature

  steadily falling, this morning

  7090before dawn the rain ran into

  deep temperatures that popped

  it white and the spruce,

  cedar, grass, roofs, and all

  tolerable surfaces took on

  7095the accumulation of white and

  when everybody got up today

  he had something to talk

  about: from 93 to 30:

  some of the snow lingers in

  7100the cedar hedges almost at

  the freezing mark: it has

  changed from white to look

  almost like water but there is

  still ice enough to hold

  7105it in the boughs, so it cannot

  fall, held water, islands of

  snow:

  then there is the presence in

  the head, a figure that never

  7110speaks, immortal, apparently,

  who, even in one’s death, has

  nothing to do with what is

  taking place and will not credit

  its reality, too bemused for

  7115assent or concern

  grit, flakes, sleet, fluff,

  all day the snow snowed in

  vain

  nothing but green in the

  7120grass nothing but leaves

  in the trees

  It Snowed All Night Snow

  It snowed all night snow

  like pear-petal snow and has

  snowed all

  7125morning, skimpy flakes,

  solitary, wandering schools:

  the clouds, just discernibly

  clouds from the general gray,

  move on in a brisk

  7130wind: the buttercups,

  leant over, have surrendered

  their sturdy forms to limp

  wastrelness: the birds have

  vanished into bushes:

  7135what has come over you

  if a rope were tied between

  two posts

  there would be most play in

  the middle: coming out

  7140of the middle, the play

  diminishing, one faces

  the attached fact, the hard

  narrowing and shortening,

  the play gone out:

  7145who who had

  anything else

  to be interested

  in would be

  interested in

  7150the weather

  we mill in a room where

  a conveyor belt now and

  then entangles and brings down

  one who, mindlessly, is carried out:

  7155the others mill

  and scramble, touching bottom

  lightly, getting high

  on the archy:

  verse the room’s ventilator

  7160light showers soak my shoes

  verse writers croak my nerves

  hard feelings

  you know when

  something is wrong

  7165how grateful you

  have not been

  how many

  shocks of enlightenment

  burn out

  7170a tradition!

  after I have been

  myself enough I will

  die and go

  on being universe

  7175modren friend when dil thou do

  reaching from end to end

  cripes that my bed were in my arms

  and I in my love again

  Drip Drip

  Drip drip

  7180truck it

  in our galaxy alone

  (billions of others)

  extraterrestrial

  noncelestial life

  7185S P A C E

  the reality man has lately

  tried to conceive

  in which, however,

  solid ground,

  7190scaffolding

  ten billion people

  may dance on the

  pinhead of the earth’s

  center

  7195undercut

  footings, literally, what is

  our footing,

  not rock, motion, space—

  nothingness!

  7200(and the realization,

  tho hard,

  that that

  is the strongest

  footing, providing most

  7205options, the greatest

  range of possibility) how

  fortunate that we

  did not have it

  the way we thought we

  7210wanted it:

  the primate touching

  down lightly on

  the ground

  now, three million years later,

  7215ready to give up the ground

  THE GROUND ERA

  THE SPACE ERA

  the heavens acquire another

  side, a landing

  7220both feet on the ground

  no feet on the ground

  there is an animal, louse-like,

  but smaller, antennaed, grazing

  the winter month of dust on

  7225the bathroom windowsill:

  I love a plant

  I think too much

  I bought it

  I placed it by my bed

  7230I think

  I love it too much

  a ray of sunlight just (11:44 a.m.)

  broke through and hit

  across the leaves of

  7235my plant whose hunger and

  pleasure I feel I think

  some sit home and think

  about their feelings but

  others land elsewhere

  7240the land grows peripheral

  and less secure

  and secure nothingness moves

  centerward

  my plant!

  7245what is it sitting on,

  the center of the galaxy,

  a composition of centers

  of galaxies!

  the bedsidetable:

  7250drip drip

  the sky is drying

  hot snow

  the sky like water

  standing in a rowed field!

  7255the furrows of cloud pull

  apart and show

  the sky filling the ruts

&nbs
p; blue and clear

  mucousit cannot snoo

  7260vomitat forty too

  gush

  Some Fluffy, Long-Swaggly Catkins

  Some fluffy, long-swaggly catkins

  have fallen to the ground, heads

  swung round in looped resentment

  7265or resignation, fashionable cousins

  to the earthworm:

  the brook has moved into

  higher flow, sustained by last night’s

  slow-soaker: this morning

  7270the sky’s rinsed

  blue, the hazy blue of color informing

  itself, interrupted here and there

  by ranges of white mountains:

  if, as appears likely,

  7275reality is not a wit solid

  but a dream another

  head, perhaps, is dreaming,

  why, then . . .

  what difference does

  7280what we think and say make:

  have the mountains responded:

  is there word from

  the sea: has the sky

  looped down to question us:

  7285broadcast gathers coincidence:

  people have

  scoffed, perhaps,

  because from my

  upland upstate shelter I’ve

  7290looked out on the universe:

  but in time it will appear

  mean to have looked out on less:

  the grave quits

  speculation:

  7295feel the astonishment

  of buried roominess!

  a twinkledom in the deep!

  roots

  would coil

  7300and nest

  in the eye

  sockets

  why but

  clapper-like

  7305the hard point

  of the catkin

  unopened sways

  a tip of weight

  so the fuzzy

  7310mechanisms and

  gold pavilions

  of dispersal can

  catch and tangle

  with the wind,

  7315the ocean whose

  currents find

  otherness

  I think I am sick with a pure

  interest in beauty,

  7320a joy skinny as a fountain

  that erupts

  through entanglements

  for real loft before gravity

  unfurls fall’s umbrella

  7325the wind’s rinse over ice-enameled

  hill-ridges! how beautiful

  all winter, the light flowing

  and riding, the dark sharp

  lines of hedgerow! too

  7330spare, so lean!

  after sunrise this morning the sky

  cleared and the sun

  hit the windows with light,

  the indoor plants standing as if

  7335in celebration:

  and all day has been

  beautiful, the redbud blooming,

  apple trees blossoming, so

  many scents and colors, the

  7340brown fingers of spruce

  shaking dust, so much and

  water trickling in the

  ditches, trickling

  disconcerted like ridge water

  7345I break poetry off

  I have not earned very much

  I am not worthy of the

  energy that winds up

  spruce tops and floats off

  7350into the air still winding,

  also I am denied much,

  this beauty, though very

  beautiful, is an inconsiderable

  feast,

  7355a snack enlarged to

  astonishment where love

  has little meeting

  My Father, I Hollow for You

  My father, I hollow for you

  in the ditches

  7360O my father, I say,

  and when brook light, mirrored,

  worms

  against the stone ledges

  I think it an unveiling

  7365or coming loose, unsheathing

  of flies

  O apparition, I cry,

  you have entered in

  and how may you come

  7370out again

  your teeth will not

  root

  your eyes cannot

  unwrinkle, your handbones

  7375may not quiver and stir

  O, my father, I cry,

  are you returning:

  I breathe and see:

  it is not you yet it is you

  I Knew

  7380I knew

  if I

  went for

  a walk

  I’d get

  7385my feet

  wet but

  only so

  I Cannot Re-wind the Brook

  I cannot re-wind the brook,

  back it up and make

  7390it flow through again ten

  times till

  it achieves the highest

  compression, the concentrated

  essential, of being a brook,

  7395brookness finally found and

  held away from all brooks:

  but the brook shoots muddy

  with perfect

  accuracy the morning after

  7400rain and in

  a dry season

  tinkles clarity, the

  truest music birds know:

  I never want to throw out

  7405the brook because it is

  nearly dry or too noisy

  so long as it

  tells the truth, an

  accuracy of all the other

  7410dispositions, hills, marshes,

  declivities, undergound ways

  of the terrain surround, an

  instantaneous, just summary

  and announcement:

  7415art is not nature

  but the flow, brook-like, in the mind

  is nature

  and should it be

  superhumanly swollen

  7420to art’s grandeurs when the accuracies

  (absolute) of nature please

  suitably to our context: an

  ear of corn too high or heavy

  is not worth planting:

  7425art too strong or weak

  betrays the living man:

  poetry that wrestles

  down all but a few

  has its holding: but

  7430the people, where they

  turn their attention,

  that is humanity:

  our chief light

  will put out

  7435its light by

  first putting too

  much light out

  I should be buying something

  I go on paying

  7440spells narrow inif all is appearance

  on sayings andit is still without

  catch the feelingliberty for we must

  say the exact air

  of this & that mere

  7445illusion

  gardeners aren’t fairweatherers

  for weeds work

  the cold, damp, cloudy days

  like weeds as

  7450much as roses

  and you never

  lack for liking

  Considering the Variety

  Considering the variety,

  nicety, formal hardness,

  7455careful contours of things

  (how sight is filled with

  the apparency of these) one

  wonders about the byways of flow,

  not much yelling of change

  7460noticeable, dead trees (live

  housing—will vines start

  to dead trees) standing

  hard, sun- and wind-rinsed:

  the rumor of flow, one

  7465wonders if invisibility

  suppresses that, wind, water

  carrying on, rearranging,

  both clear, sometimes muddy,
<
br />   dusty, leaf-shown: and

  7470underground, a stirring,

  melting:

  is flux invisible to be

  kept out of sight

  or to emphasize the made:

  7475would designed

  finery lose its strut and hard

  joyousness if it

  lost majority: still, not an item,

  not even the stones, has not been often

  7480milled away and away, if come

  back in a stone or divided

  participating in many stones:

  (the time at the heart of

  stones is no greater, but purer,

  7485than that of the wearing surface)

  but whatever flow dissolves

  flow also brought the

  nourishment of, the great

  spirits flow through our forms,

  7490declaring themselves through us,

  the freedom of sequence, the leap

  from one to another, the

  essential preserved:

  but considerable lamentation,

  7495though most scenes are quiet,

  lamentation of the inexplicable,

  lamentation against recalcitrant

  fact, that though nothing is lost,

  nothing, still the particular

  7500is, that self or shape, so

  carefully contrived,

  crumbled, collapsed, its flow

  lost in flow:

  in this contemplation not a

  7505wall, board, or splinter

  yields: the alternatives,

  side to side, are blank:

  here, with breakdown,

  gaiety, contrivance, and

  7510immortality are sustained:

  earth turns the bitter, sour,