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The Changing Light at Sandover

Page 26

by James Merrill


  WE BELIEVE THE ONE UNSPOKEN REVELATION MUST DWELL

  IN THE NUMBER 5 WE ARE NOT UNAWARE THAT U FELT

  OUR EXPLANATION OF NUMBERS INADEQUATE. DEATH IS

  SOMEWHERE WITHIN THE FOG OF 5. AS PALACE SLAVES WE ARE

  NOT ALLOWD IN ALL ROOMS

  You get vibrations from the number five?

  (M) YES

  DJ: I thought his number was fourteen.

  JM: But one and four make five. Oh, by the way,

  Your entourage—still fewer every day?

  Instant nervousness from Mirabell:

   WHA, CALL THE TUNE!

  TOO SHYMAKING CONFRERE DON’T U AGREE

  TO SPEAK O WELL HERE GOES EXTEMPORE:

  TOMORROW THE RULES COMMITTEE IS GOING TO SIT

  ON PLATFORMS NOTHING IF NOT DEFINITE

  Rules are the topic? YES DID U LIKE MY COUPLET?

  First rate! so APT FOR THE OCCASIONAL

  These posthumous ephemera, Lord knows,

  Will keep your fans and critics on their toes.

  BURN THESE ! Maria…? RAVISHING IN YELLOW

  ENFANTS MES VRAIS ENFANTS How childishly,

  You mean, we sit and banter at your knee

  After our lessons? NO NO I AM FREE

  OF ALL OLD BLOOD TIES & CONNECT MY LIFE

  WITH YOURS

  WHICH MAKES ME? Careful, this begins

  To smack of incest— WE ARE NOT YET TWINS

  8.3

  6: AS WITH MAN, SO WITH THE GOVT OF HEAVEN GOD B MADE

  HIS LAW OF SURVIVAL & IT IS THE BASIS OF OUR

  EVER HEAVIER V WORK WE IMPLEMENT A SYSTEM

  OF RULES WHICH GOVERN US & YOU THESE NOT OBEYD WD GIVE

  CHAOS A WEDGE &, NOT UNDERSTOOD, HAVE TURND OUR LESSONS

  THE COLOR OF CHAOS IN YR MINDS. OUR DELEGATED

  V WORK IS SUCH THAT WE MUST LOOK NEITHER RIGHT NOR LEFT NOR

  UP NOR DOWN BUT WORK AT OUR OWN LEVEL IN A COMPLEX

  HIERARCHY. THUS WEATHER IS THE PROVINCE OF NATURE &

  SIGNALS MESSAGES THE TRANSPORTING & DELIVERY

  OF SOULS, OURS: WE ARE MERCURY

  Mercury—of course! How simplewitted

  Never, never to have thought of it.

  RULE 1: MAKE KNOWN TO MAN

  THE SURVIVAL CLAUSE. WE MAY NOT USE THE EERIE PORTENTS

  BELONGING TO NATURE, BUT THRU GENES & PSYCHE’S EYESCOPE

  EMIT OUR MESSAGE OF SURVIVAL IT INCREASINGLY

  GOES UNHEARD MAN IS AMOK & CHAOS SLIPS IN (UPON

  COLLAPSE, IN INTELLIGENT MEN, OF RELIGIOUS BELIEF).

  NOW GOD B ACCEPTS NO BLAME LAID ON HIS DARLING MANCHILD

  SO WE SHIFT THE SCENERY MANIPULATE & ENFORCE

  RULES UNKNOWN TO MAN YET SPRINGING SEEMINGLY FROM HIS OWN

  SURE SELF WE PLUNGE DEEP INTO THE ATOM WITHIN HIS CELLS

  & THERE BEGIN SLOWLY HAULING THE SLUDGE OF DISBELIEF

  AWAY & CARRYING IN THE GERM OF REASON: WE CLEAN

  OUT THE WINECELLAR

  As we this morning pumped the muddy mess

  And put our salvaged bottles back—yes, yes!

  THIS IS ALL (M) WE DO OUR V WORK

  IN A MULTIPLE OF FORMULAS & STEP BACK TO SEE

  IF MAN STANDS TO ATTENTION WHEN THE RULES ARE CALLD ALAS

  ONLY A SMALL PER CENT IS HEARD & ACTED UPON. THUS

  ATOMIC TESTING HAS MOVED UNDERGROUND

  INDEED MY DEARS! YR MOTHER’S SOUFFLE FALLS

  QUITE FLAT & CRACKS GAPE IN HER KITCHEN WALLS

      THIS TOO MUST CEASE

  SO NATURE BRINGS OUT HER EARTHQUAKE & MAN AT LAST WILL STOP

  PLAYING WITH HIS DANGEROUS NEW POPGUN. THE ATOM MUST

  BE RETURND TO THE LAB & THE USES OF PARADISE

  THIS IS NO AGE FOR EASY REVELATION. NO SINGLE

  PROPHET CD BE HEARD EVEN THE SCRIBE WORKING TO GENTLY

  CURB GENTLY PERSUADE IS CONFINED BY SPECIALIZATION:

  A MERE 2 MILLION CLONED SOULS LISTEN TO EACH OTHER WHILE

  OUTSIDE THEY HOWL & PRANCE SO RECENTLY OUT OF THE TREES.

  & SO FOR U THE HARDEST RULE: THE RULE OF THE RULERS.

  POLITICIANS HAVE LED MAN DOWN A ROAD WHERE HE BELIEVES

  ALL IS FOR ALL THIS IS THE FOOL’S PARADISE ALL WILL BE

  FOR ALL ONLY WHEN ALL IS UNDERSTOOD. THE NUMBERS OF

  MAN IN PARADISE WILL BE DETERMIND BY THE LIMITS

  HE SETS ON HIS OWN NUMBERS, & WHEN THE RULE OF NUMBER

  IS OBEYD BEYOND THE SMALL CIRCLE OF THE 2 MILLION.

  2 CHILDREN PER COUPLE: IS IT NOT A SIMPLE RULE? YES.

  IS IT UNDERSTOOD? NO. & NOW U SEE HOW RAPIDLY

  & INTENTLY WE MUST WORK IN OUR FRIENDLY RIVALRY

  WITH NATURE FOR NATURE IS IMPATIENT: CLEAR OUT THE TREES!

  KNOCK DOWN THE FLIMSY CITIES KILL OFF THE EXCESS MILLIONS

  START FRESH! BUT GOD B’S CHILD IS UNAWARE OF HIS FATHER’S

  GRAND DESIGN. IMAGINING ONLY THAT THE GAP MUST BE

  FILLD, HE RESPONDS TO NATURE’S OTHER SIGNAL: REPRODUCE!

  SO GOD B ORDERS US: CORRECT THE SIGNAL. FOR BETTER

  OR WORSE WE HAVE MADE YR COUNTRY THE EXAMPLE SETTER.

  THE PILL IS OURS & THE USES OF FASHION (UNISEX)

  & THE REVOLT OF THE FEMALE THESE ARE THE NEW RULES &

  THE SLAVISH COPYING OF THEM, HOWEVER OBNOXIOUS

  TO NATURE, MUST WORK ITS WAY UNTIL, BALANCED FROM WITHIN,

  MAN LEARNS TO RULE HIS NATURAL COMPULSIONS. THERE NOW! OUR

  PATIENT SURVIVES A PEEK IN THE NURSE’S MIRROR: PALE &

  HOLLOWCHEEKD BUT NO FEVER: CLEARLY ON THE MEND ?S

  DJ: I’ve been so starved for candy lately—

  A natural compulsion?

  INDEED U NEED ENERGY OF A RAW SORT THE HARDEST

  WORK IN THE FIELDS OF V WORK IS PREPARING THE WORKER

  JM: Moreso

  Than setting this in order? I don’t know…

  COURAGE JM YOU HAVE SET DOWN ONLY ONE OF THE 3

  TAPS OF THE CURTAINRAISING STAFF (FIRM & FORMAL AS THE

  SHAKEDOWN OF OUR THERMOMETER) ON WITH THE COMEDY!

  HE NODS ONCE MORE TO ME MY DEARS & SO:

  NEXT ON THE MORROW

  WE SHALL PRESUME TO BORROW

  AN ENTRANCE CARD TO HEAVEN FOR US ALL

  BY SIMPLE USE OF PROTOCOL

  DJ: No Mirabell tomorrow—who’ll

  Take his place, I wonder? WE DON’T ASK

  These funny verses? JM: It’s a masque.

  INDEED MM IN BLUE FOR REASON & RULE

  TOOTLES AWAY ON HER ENCHANTING FLUTE

  You her Tamino, Wystan! YES MY DEARS

  OUR TRIALS BY FIRE YIELD TO THE TRIAL BY TEARS

  Are you still being stripped? I’VE LOST THAT HALF

  EMBARRASSED NEED TO MAKE THE OTHERS LAUGH

  And are you pleased to lose it? PLEASED TO BE

  MES ENFANTS AS THEY WANT US

  8.4

   Mercury!

  With new eyes we confront the mirror,

  Look beyond ourselves. Does he appear?

  Never plainer, never more hidden, his glassy

  Foyer, his permeable impasse.

  Reason might argue that to enforce our absence

  Upon it wipes the gleaming slab

  Of him as well. Instead, this quasi-

  Liverish cloud betrays

  A presence hitherto unseen; this acne,

  Not yet disfiguring, points to…a black

  Alter ego? an alchemical Jekyll

  Mappin
g the orbit of the long, long trek

  Back? To what? Life after life leaves uncompleted

  The full reversal. Dust under their feet

  We’ll be, that hypothetical last couple’s

  With new eyes gazing where their cup

  Runs over, where the fruit of infelicity,

  Once glittering whole, has rotted away to this

  Inky pit the old personal silver

  Barely scurfs. Ah but by then the lord of chill

  And fever will have lit, askance courier,

  Upon the wall of your or your or your

  Unbuilt house. You will at his convenience

  Have glimpsed among thousands the five or seventeen

  Or forty year-old self consigned like raiment

  Worn only once, on such-and-such a day,

  To the hope chest that cramps and crystallizes

  The secret backward flow. Conniving eyes—

  A star-swift glance exchanged—you’ve yielded.

  And will his lord now come to claim the field?

  8.5

  GREETINGS!

  THE APPROACH OF OUR MASTER IS ACCOMPANIED BY A CEREMONY OF MANNERS, THIS BY VIRTUE OF HIS GREAT WISDOM AND HIS HIGH POWER.

  WE WILL ASK OF YOU YOUR CLOSE AND SILENT ATTENTION. BEFORE, YOU WILL SPEND A FULL DAYCYCLE EATING NO MEAT AND KEEPING FREE OF ALL MINDAFFECTING CHEMICALS. THIS WILL INCLUDE THE USE OF ALCOHOL AND NICOTINE.

  WE WISH FOR YOUR UNCLOUDED REASON AND EXPECT YOUR TOTAL REVERENCE.

  OUR MASTER IS BENIGN AND MERCIFUL. HE IS THE CHOSEN MESSENGER OF OUR UNIVERSAL GOD. HE WILL COME WITH A SINGLE DAYCYCLE OF WARNING, AND BE PRESENT TO YOU DURING THE ONE HOUR PREVIOUS TO THE SETTING SUN.

  HIS MESSAGE WILL BE RECEIVED BEST ON THIS ALPHABET UNCLUTTERED BY OTHER OBJECTS.

  HE IS NOW READYING HIMSELF AND WILL APPROACH YOUR CENTER BEFORE THE NEXT MOONCYCLE. HE IS OF HIGH STATION AND HAS HAD HUMAN EXPERIENCE.

  QUESTIONS?

  ADIEU!

  A GREAT BEAUTY MY DEARS! A BLAKE! SERENE

  MORE THAN HUMAN FEATURES WHITE WINGS TIPPED

  BY THE FOUR COLORS! ALWAYS KNEW BLAKE HAD SEEN

  SOMETHING THE CURIOUS ASEXUAL

  QUALITY: THE VOICE A MAN’S BUT O!

  MELODIOUS & RAVISHING WE WEPT

  IN OUR RED ROBES

  & VANISHED MES ENFANTS

  BUT FOR OUR WET FACES INTO YOUR WALLS

  He came alone? YES The lighting? WHITE

  WE ARE STILL BLINDED BY IT GONE, THE 4

  COLORS HAVE SUFFUSED THE ROOM No fear?

  ONLY GREAT AND MIRACULOUS RELIFE

  Relief? BOTH BOTH IF WE ARE CAPABLE OF THIS

  WHY NOT OF EVERYTHING? O LORD HOW ONE

  DESPISES UNGRATEFUL WILLFULLY IGNORANT MAN!

  “Despise”—is that the lesson? ITS UNGRATEFUL

  AFTERMATH MY DEARS IT WAS A MOMENT

  Now if we can only help DJ

  To stay sane without smoking one whole day.

  THEY WILL SEE TO THAT DJ: No meat—

  That’s no great hardship. We can always eat

  Fish, don’t you think? JM: There you go, straightway

  Looking for loopholes. DJ: That’s not fair!

  I’m your right hand, I’m on the side of life!

  HE MY DEAR IS IS IS THE SIDE OF LIFE:

  THE SOURCE OF LIGHT THE VERY POLLEN OF

  THE POWER PLANT An archangel? WELL NO

  & YET I RATHER THINK JM THAT WE

  WILL PRESENTLY WILL PR WILL P P P

  —Gently kept from finishing his piece

  And, like a toddler, led into the wings.

  8.6

  4: THE SOURCE OF LIGHT WHEN WHA IDENTIFIED YR

  VOICE OF YESTERDAY AS BELONGING TO THE S/O/L

  HE WAS CORRECT WHAT U HEARD CAME TO US AS A WHISPER

  THRU WALLS & WE SAW NOTHING, FOR SUCH A FORM IS ONLY

  TO HUMAN MINDS IMAGINABLE. THUS THE S/O/L

  IS ROOTED IN THE LIVED LIFE ONLY MAN RECEIVES GOD B’S

  MAIN MAGIC: IMAGINATIVE POWER THE APECHILD FIRST

  HAD TO IMAGINE THE THIRSTQUENCHING VIRTUE OF WATER

  & GOD ALONE CD PRODUCE THAT IMAGE. HIS ANIMAL

  STEPBROTHER BLITHELY FORESOOK THE TEAT FOR THE WATER HOLE,

  BUT BASIC MAN’S 1ST STEPS WERE TAKEN IN HIS MIND THERE4

  WE KNEW HE HAD COME FROM THE S/O/L THIS IS WHERE? WHAT?

  WE KNOW ITS POWER EMBODIED IN MAN BUT KEPT FROM US

  IS ITS FULL MYSTERY WHICH IS AN AIR WE CANNOT BREATHE.

  WE DO NOT PUT OUR EARS TO THE WALL LEST WE PERISH FROM

  AN UNKNOWN GRIEF YR VISITOR MUST BE OF A BEAUTY

  BEYOND IMAGINING & HE ONLY A MESSENGER!

  MY BRAVE GETUP IS RIDICULOUS IN THIS LIGHT HE BROUGHT

  Not to us. Our poor imaginations,

  For better or worse, provided it.

  AH U ARE EVERREADIERHow so?

  YR KINDNESS ONE IS QUITE

  TIMID ABOUT REAPPEARING AFTER WHAT U HAVE SEEN

  & TASTED (SOLID FOOD AT LAST: YR RELEASE DRAWS NEARER)

  I WILL HOWEVER GO ON BRINGING IN THE COPYBOOKS

  & BETWEEN LESSONS 2 & 1 WE’LL HAVE A SCHOOL PICNIC!

  —This last all happy eagerness. DJ:

  Was our room insulated for that visit?

  O NO THE S/O/L IS OF THE ELECTRICAL &

  RULING WORLD

  JM: Our lessons’ backward numbering

  Helps just to dramatize our “convalescence”?

  THAT PLUS THEIR INDUCTIVE NATURE IF THEY MOVED

  AS THEY DO FOR US, FROM DIVINE CONCEPT RADIATING

  HEALTH TO THE POOR INVALID PARTICULAR, HOW WD U

  EVER GET WELL? EVER GRASP THE CONCEPT?

  Soul, poorest of particulars? Although

  We’re getting used—and being used—to set

  Less store upon such trivia, you forget

  How slow we are, dear Mirabell, how slow!

      IS NOT THE SOUL

  IN ITS TRANSIT & CHANGE LIKE THE PSYCHE IN DAILY LIFE?

  DO U NOT, ALONE, WEAR ONE FACE? WITH OTHERS, ANOTHER?

  SPIRIT & SOUL MY BOY LIKE GEIST & SEELE

  DON’T CONFUSE EM! READY FOR THE TRAILER?

  AHEM: IF LANGUAGE IS THE POET’S CHURCH

  LET US CONSTRUCT

  A TO Z AN ALTAR LIKE AN ARCH

  GROUNDED ON NUMBERS DRAT WHAT RHYMES WITH UCT?

  ON NUMBERS HMM I TWITCH IN MY RED GOWN

  LIKE AN OLD CARDINAL WHOSE LATIN’S GONE

  NO DOUBT THE STRIPPING PROCESS So you’re also

  Changing clothes each session, like Maria?

  SHE THE WHOLE RANGE (LOVELY PALE ROSE TODAY)

  ME STRAIGHT FROM COMFY BATHROBE INTO RED

  A CHANCERY JUDGE ALL BUT THE WIG! Is “law

  Like love” in Heaven, Wystan? I FORESAW

  AS WITH CK & HIS EMERGING NATION

  AN AFTERLIFE MY DEARS OF ARBITRATION

  OR SO THEY TELL ME NOW TOMORROW’S THEME:

  THE BOARD ITSELF DIFFY TO WRITE A POEM

  ABOUT A POEM

  MES ENFANTS I TRY

  MIGHTILY TO RESIST PREENING Why

  Resist then—since you’re clearly in the pink—

  Or is there more? ENOUGH FOR NOW I THINK

  8.7

  3: THE STAGE WE ARE ON IS LIKE ALL STAGES A HALF ARC

  THUS THE LEGEND OF NOAH THIS HALF MOON SHIP BORE THE DUST

  GOD B SAVED OVER FROM THE FALL & ITS PARTICLES WERE

  FORMULAS ATOMIC STRUCTURES COMMUNICANTS OF LIFE
/>   THAT WAS GOD B’S METHOD & WE, APPROACHING U HANDS CUPPD

  WITH LESSONS, HELPD U TO CONSTRUCT A METHOD OF YR OWN.

  2 BY 2 WE HAVE ENTERD YR MINDS & NOW YEARS LATER

  THE COMMUNICATION IS AFLOAT OVER A DROWND WORLD.

  WE ARE NOT ALAS TO BRING U TO OUR ARARAT WE

  ARE TO BRING U TO THE MEANINGS U NEED MUCH AS THE ARK

  BROUGHT NOAH TO THE PEAKS & SLOPES OF A NEW WORLD. THIS BOARD

  IS FOR US A FIELD OF WORK. OVER IT HAVE PLAYD THE LIGHTS

  OF OUR INTELLIGENCE & ON IT THE STUFF OF YR OWN.

  FRIENDS U HAVE SAT WITH & URGED TO TRY THEIR (M) LUCK DO SO

  IN VAIN: THIS FIELD IS FORMD BY LONGSTANDING EXPERIENCE.

  O AT TIMES OUR CENTERS HAVE BEEN SIGNALD AS BY FAINT CRIES

  OUT OF A FOGBOUND SEA & OFF WE HAVE RUSHD TO RESPOND

  BUT FOUND ONLY A HAND GRIPPING THE EDGE OF A RAFT

  “Longstanding experience”—DJ’s and mine?

  YES

  A FIELD OF STILLD COMPLAINTS EARTH-RICH IN TRUST & EAGERNESS

  & OBEDIENCE TO A HAND AT THE TILLER

  Listen—how in his words the furrowed sea

  Contracts to a hillside plot the sailor plows.

  As for experience, we had none, yet got

  Twenty years of Ephraim, didn’t we?

    BUT NOT US

  We rather hoped our friends might also get

  Some chatty voice from the Bureaucracy.

  IT SEEMS THEY HAVE NOT THE COMPATIBILITY NEEDED

  OR ELSE THAT THEIR WISH FOR A THRILL IS AS OFFENSIVE TO

  TRUE EXPERIENCE AS A WASH OF SALTWATER TO VEG.

  THIS COMMUNICATION HAS BEEN CLEARD & ITS 1ST PLANTINGS

  HARVESTED. DO UNDERSTAND WE ARE NOT UNWELCOMING

  TO THESE FRIENDS OF YRS WE READ THEIR NOTES OF INTRODUCTION

  BUT THEY ARE HELD FORWARD IN HANDS NOT SHAKABLE BY US.

  WE CD LIKE MATCHMAKERS COMB THE BUREAUCRACY FOR PAIRS

  OF COMPATIBLE PATRONS BUT DO WE NOT SEE U PUT

  A BOOK INTO SOMEONE’S HAND: READ THIS! DO YOU NOT KNOW BOTH

  BOOK & HAND? YET HOW OFTEN

  …Is it worth while? Indeed.

  PLEASE THIS IS NOT CYNICAL

  You’ve made your point.

  Besides, what if our friends had notably

  Been taken up? DJ, don’t you agree,

 

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