He wasn’t the first. A certain Cabel Stone
Whose transcript came to light again this summer—
CHATTING? GAMES? WHAT A DAY! HAVE I NOT CHOSEN GLORIOUS
WEATHER FOR OUR PICNIC? ARE WE NOW GRAINY WITH ?S
Here’s one. You’re now “the master of your tribe”.
Our talks kick you upstairs? Are there no longer
Powers above you?
O YES I AM NOTHING SPECIAL MY USUAL WORK WAS
IN THE CLASSROOM OF THE WOMB REDDER EVEN THAN THIS ONE.
THEN ONE BRIGHT MOMENT THEY NEEDED SOMEONE MILD & PATIENT
I QUALIFIED Then came your transformation.
INDEED I AM CHANGED WHO KNOWS, I MAY DO
SOME USEFUL WORK IN THE (M) FUTURE? & AT NIGHT COME HOME
SLIP INTO MY MIRABELL ROBES & DREAM OF THESE OLD TIMES
But in what sense a “master” now?
FOR ME TO INSTRUCT & TO ANSWER U THEY (MY MASTERS)
OPEND THEIR FILES OF MYTH & LEGEND, FACT & LANGUAGE THIS
HAS NOW BECOME AN UNCHANGEABLE PART OF MY NEW RANK
FOR HE WHO KNOWS THE MYSTERIES, IS HE NOT BEYOND THEM?
TO MY ECHELONS I AM NOW A MINISTER WITH(OUT)
PORTFOLIO WELL I BOAST IT’S A PICNIC, NO?
And Ephraim?
YOUR E’S
STORY CONNECTS WITH YR 1ST LESSONS WITH THE GLOWING STONES
THESE AS U KNOW MARKD OUR LANDING STRIPS OF OLD: MONOLITHS
CHARGED MASSIVELY BY US WITH URANIUM
Which over the millenia lost power.
AS DID WE.
SOME FEW OF THE MOST PROMINENT REMAIN STILL VISIBLE
LIKE FAINT BEACONS IN OUR MEMORY BANKS OUR (M) MECCAS
THEY DRAW US & OUR RETINUES FROM THE BUREAUCRACY.
WE MAY COME AS YR E EXPLAIND WITH OFTEN FRIGHTENING
ASPECT TO THESE OLD POWER SOURCES (THERE IS NO CLOUDLAND
IN THE BERNINI SENSE OF ANGELS DANGLING THEIR FEET ETC.
HEAVEN, REMEMBER, CD FIT IN THIS CUP OR BE VASTER
THAN EARTH ITSELF) ROUND US OUR DEAD GROUP & DISPERSE, REGROUP
NOT UNLIKE DIFFERENT SPECIES OF BIRDS PASSING SETTLING
FLYING ON THEY CIRCLE SPOTS, OFTEN A GLOWING STONE POINT,
WHERE THERE IS (M) FOOD GOSSIP, A SCRAP OF NEWS THEY ARE SHY
ALARMD WHEN MASSES OF THE NEWLY DEAD APPROACH HOWLING
LIKE DOGS IN A PACK ON THEIR WAY FROM CARNAGE WE MUST SAY
QUIET! BACK TO WORK! & THEY ARE CALMD INTO USEFULNESS.
SO THOSE GLOWING ANCHOR STONES WHERE ONCE OUR (ARE U READY?)
CABLES RAN ARE MEETING PLACES
Cables? Cabel Stone! Are you implying—
STATING: WE SPOKE TO U
WITH THIS COMPOSITE VOICE (ITS FORMULA BASED ON YR OWN)
IN THAT 1ST YEAR OF YR LOVE. WE HAD HEARD YR SIGNAL &
DESCENDED ATTRACTING THE USUAL SWARM SUCH A DIN
FOR THERE WAS THIS TIME A GLOW WE KNEW IT WAS NO IDLE
COMMUNICATION YET OUR LAW OF NONINTERFERENCE
KEPT US FROM MAKING YR RAFT FAST TO THE SHORES OF THE DEAD.
RATHER WE GENTLY TOUCHD U WITH THE BARGEPOLE OF A VOICE
NOT SO COMPELLING AS TO DRAW U IN BUT SUFFICIENT
TO TEST YR READINESS. THERE FOLLOWD THE SELECTION &
TRAINING OF THE COMMUNICANT NOW WHY THIS MAY I SAY
FRIVOLOUS GREEK?
We were frivolous—don’t rub it in.
BUT SCRIBES, & THE GREEK WAS OF A NATURE
GIVEN TO STORYTELLING HIS SWEETNESS & USEFULNESS
HAD BEEN PROVEN B4: HE WAS OUR ENTREE AT VERSAILLES
WE TIPTOED IN ON HIS HEELS IT HAD BEEN GOD B’S PURPOSE
TO LEAD MAN BY A CHAIN OF HUMAN EVENTS AWAY FROM
THE ABSOLUTISM OF KINGS. YR EPHRAIM EFFACED HIMSELF
AMONG THE MIRRORS WE TOOK ROOT THE COURT TOOK THE POISON
OF FRIVOLOUS & OUTRAGEOUS EXCESS WE UNDERSTOOD
THAT YR GREEK’S TALENTS WERE (MAY I SAY) NOT UNCIVILIZED.
TIME PASSD FOR U WE WORKD WITH EPHRAIM WHO STRUCK A BARGAIN
(HOW CURIOUS I STRUCK THAT SAME BARGAIN WITH MY MASTERS)
THAT WHEN HIS WORK WAS DONE HE WD STILL BE IN TOUCH WITH U
A bargain, Mirabell? With us as prize?
O YES U HAVE A GREAT MAGNETISM FOR US POOR BORED TYPES
(Bargains and more bargains, well, well, well!
But far cries from that fierce original one
Struck by Faust—the sulphur flash redone
A la Redon in aquarelle.
Bowdlerized of sufferings to come
As of past guile, the finest print now reads
That, should the garden path be lost in weeds,
Ministers of eternal tedium
Will claim our souls and lead them by the hand
Under crossed swords of the ten thousand things
To an emotionless exchange of rings
Here where the great altar used to stand…
But life’s no picnic—one more reason not
To overcloud today’s with afterthought.)
Instead: So Ephraim was your pupil? We
Often felt you spoke in the same way.
A LONG STYLISTIC TRADITION FOR U HAVE ALSO HEARD
MY TEACHER’S VOICE AS DID DANTE FROM THE MENDICANT’S LIPS
The one you call 00, who taught Akhnaton?
OUR MOST GLOWING INTELLIGENCE: AS RADIANT SHADOW
HE WILL SCOOP UP THE WHITE ONES’ PATH ON YR FIELD & FOLLOW
THEM IN, STOOPING UNDER THE BURDEN OF SUCH AN HONOR
One of the Fallen will pass through those doors…?
But a hushed question mark is all he dares.
9.3
Dear E! AS EINSTEIN KNEW WHEN HE DECLARED
HIM ANY EMCEE’S EQUAL, EVEN SQUARED
DJ: Funny, I’d steeled myself just now
To hear that Ephraim, too, was a composite
Voice, a formula thought up by you.
HE IS THAT AS WELL AS AM I MY FRIENDS & AS YOU ARE
With more than customary emphasis
He starts on Ephraim’s formula: 2 7
9—but my pen balks. I hope to Heaven
Numerals play no further part in this!
We’re healed of Number. True, it’s Mirabell’s
Mother tongue, his motor—in whose purr,
However, a new drone of wear and tear
On all concerned increasingly foretells
The breakdown among golden fields, days hence,
The calvary, years hence, of rusted parts.
It is the one note our instructor’s arts
Can’t stifle: his encroaching obsolescence.
I—like Greek peasantry, till all hours glued
To new TV sets, that no flickering guest
Shown out, still talking, by a button pressed
Into the yawning blackness, think them rude—
Check my impulse (dreadful if he heard!)
And, sure enough, that key-stopped wound within
The left side of a dented, blue-green tin
Mirabell catches, resumes. From our dear bird
Outpouring numbers—music to his ears—
Fill the page, cage of our own lifelong
Intolerance of such immortal song.
At its end, gone? OFF FOR A DIP MY DEARS
NEXT HE’LL BE WEARING A LAMPSHADE! IS HE NOT
A LOVE SO TOUCHINGLY SOLICITOUS
WE’RE SCARCELY WARMED THRU WHEN HE MOTIONS US
TO A SAFE DISTANCE Still? INDEED RED HOT!
& SO WE PADDLE ON
MES ENFANTS WHO’S
READY BESIDE MAMAN FOR A LONG SNOOZE?
9.4
Amuse us! Have you never, Mirabell,
Had an escapade? never raised (m) Hell?
VERY WELL: WE ONCE REPLACED AN INFANT WITH A KIND OF
EXPERIMENTAL DOLL IT HAD BEGUN AS A GIRL CHILD
THESE BEING NOT SO PRIZED OR SO ATTENTIVELY STUDIED
BY CHINESE PARENTS IN THE YEAR 1899 OUR FIRST
DNA U MIGHT SAY. WE SUBTRACTED FROM LIVING FLESH
THE REBORN SOUL, INSERTING ANOTHER WHOLLY FASHIOND
OF ANIMAL MINERAL VEGETABLE ELEMENTS
BALANCED TO PRODUCE A SIMULAR HUMAN PROPONENT
WITHOUT DRAWING UPON THE (AS WE KNEW) SOON TO BE SCARCE
REAL THING
But how grotesque, a soul by Arcimboldi
Made out of fruits and shellfish?
THE CHILD GREW HER ODD AFFINITIES AMAZED US:
WITH FOR EXAMPLE THE MINERAL ELEMENTS SHE WD
AFTER LONG SEARCH BE FOUND AS IF LISTENING FACEDOWN IN
A ROADSIDE DITCH SHE QUOTED BIRDSONG & CRIES & CD SPEAK
INTIMATELY WITH THE CAT & AT TIMES GLOWD WITH A BRIGHT
SULPHUROUS LIGHT: REORGANIZING HER OWN CHEMICALS.
SHE WAS CALLD FIREFLY IN HER VILLAGE
And then what?
SHE GREW SHE GREW
SHE GREW AT NEARLY 3 METERS HER FAMILY SOLD HER
TO THE COURT AT PEKING WHERE FOR THE LAST MONTH OF HER LIFE
THEY SAT ASTONISHD ABOUT HER & SHE MADE SONGS KNOWN AS
THE SONGS OF FIREFLY WOMAN HIGHPITCHT NOTES SO PIERCING
THE OLD EMPRESS FINALLY ORDERD HER SHUT UP IN A
CELLAR ROOM & THERE LIKE A PLANT WITHOUT NATURAL LIGHT
SHE PERISHD AGE 27: OUR LAST ESCAPADE
One trusts you were severely reprimanded.
INDEED
NOT IT WAS PERMITTED WE DO NOTHING WITHOUT LICENSE.
SHE IS NOW DISPERSD THRU 1000S OF LIVES A MOST PRECIOUS
DENSITY BUT OUR LAST ATTEMPT TO MANUFACTURE SOULS
How is it no deformity ensues
From, say, the rat souls you’ve been forced to use?
THESE ARE ACCUSTOMD TO THE COMMANDING IMAGE OF MAN
AS FOR (M) HELL, IT IS HERE IS BOUNDLESS YET ITS VERSIONS
IN HOMER & DANTE WERE NEEDED (UNDERGROUND SHELTERS
FROM LIGHT) BY DULL ANIMALISTIC LIVES FOR WHOM TRUTH TOO
STRONGLY SHONE. THE ENLIGHTEND ARE JUST THAT: FREE OF THE HELLS
THAT ON EARTH DAMN ALL OF U AT MOMENTS SOME FLEETINGLY
OTHERS INCESSANTLY. DOUBT IS YR HELL JM AS YOURS
DJ IS FEAR. HELL IS THE CAVE OF PSYCHE & HARKS BACK
TO ONE MORNING WHEN APECHILD’S PATH FROM HIS 1ST WATERHOLE
IN EDEN CROSSD THAT OF A FIERCE CROUCHING CAT & GOD B
ALLOWD (B4 STRIKING IT DOWN) THE LESSON FEAR TO REACH
DEEPLY INTO THE SACRED IMAGINATION AGES
PASSD B4 THE CHILD WD WALK ALONE. THIS WAS THE FIRST HELL:
TO KNOW THAT EVEN IN EDEN WAS DANGER
It is the last Hell, too. In our own time
To know that Earth is threatened, Heaven as well.
IN MAN’S MIND
HELL FLOURISHD SO UNCONTAINABLY THAT A DARK COUNTRY
WAS GIVEN IT & A REASSURING BORDER PATROL.
THERE ALL THE PSYCHE’S WOES WERE PUT A FEAST OF SIN BEGAN.
LATELY, THRU OUR CLONING OF SUCH AS FREUD & THE DECLINE
OF RELIGIOUS FEAR, HELL HAS AGAIN (M) SURFACED BUT MAN’S
IMAGINATION, FREED FOR OTHER WORK, FINDS NONE FINDS DRUGS:
THE CHILD OF NATURE WD RATHER RUN HIDE WONDER SATE HIS
APPETITE THAN SIT LONELY AT THE TESTTUBE THIS IS OUR
CHALLENGE: ELIMINATE HELL MAKE MAN THE CLONE OF GOD.
9.5
A Sunday hush. Table uncleared. Grandmother
About to take her pill in trembling water
Cocks her head: “An angel’s passing over…”
Seeing nothing, each looks at the other.
THE TIME HAS NOW COME DEAR ONES TO START READYING THE FIELD
BRUSHING UP CRUMBS & PRACTISING OUR VARIOUS EFFECTS
TO BE SURE THE PATIENT WALKS OUT WITH A CLEAN BILL OF HEALTH.
YR VISITOR WILL COME IN 2 FULL DAYCYCLES
On Saturday. You’ll come tomorrow, though?
FOR OUR
FINAL LESSON, NUMBER 1: SOME SIMPLE EXERCISES
B4 IT U WILL REMOVE FROM THIS SURFACE: CANDLESTICKS
SALT ASHTRAY PLANT ALL BUT OUR BOARD & CUP, NOTEBOOK & PEN
THE BETTER TO REHEARSE TECHNIQUES OF CONCENTRATION
And after? Will you ever come again? o
I’LL BE AROUND WITH THE BRANDY FLASK BUT NOW THE BLANKET
IS FOLDED THE BASKET IS REPACKD OUR SUN IS SETTING
& WE? WE WAIT FOR AN ADVENTURE TO BEGIN GOOD NIGHT
En route, that same sun-flooded evening,
To dine back country, something black gives chase
Highspiritedly barking—ah, slow down!
As in a bad dream the dog veers, is hit,
Not hard, but…D and I walk back to it
Struggling, hind legs motionless. From his white house
Flush with the road great treetops meet above
A shirtless freckled boy has run, in shock
Cradles the dusty head. Both look at us
Not to blame, but not accepting, either,
Our stammered offer. If a vet nearby—?
Dumbly the boy keeps motioning us towards
The car. We back off, late already. Yet
For the remaining mile cannot find words.
9.6
Lesson One: the various things to do
In order to live through
A whole day without drink or nicotine;
Then how, tomorrow afternoon, to DRESS
THE MIND in slow transparencies of blue,
Red, yellow, and green;
Approaching, beyond anxiousness,
The round white tabletop—in sight of it
A single candle lit,
And Nature’s worldwide effigy before
Our eyes—to think of Water, Earth, Air, Fire,
And of each other; not a word; submit.
But the new Visitor?
His looks and manner and attire?
Wystan’s and Maria’s eyes and ears
(Who now have none, poor dears)
Will more than serve, as always. O to miss
Nothing, and render it so vividly!
And Mirabell? Twelve last words like dry tears
Upon the page are kiss
And promise, threat and jeu d’esprit:
I WILL BE THE WOUNDED BLACK HOUND OF HEAVEN AT YR DOOR
9.7
Through which, as he leaves, a nimble presence glides:
MES CHERS CONTACT MM & WHA
‘AT THE SAME HOUR ON THE FOLLOWING DAY’
THIS MESSAGE TOSSED ME AS THEY RUSHED TO? CHANGE?
‘GOODY ANOTHER MASK’ WHATEVER THAT MEANT
I DARE NOT WONDER & MAY NEVER KNOW
STRANGE U TWO ARE NOW SO YOUTHFUL SO
UNBLURRED IN OUTLINE Thanks to having heard,
Perhaps, what part a honey-golden Greek
Played in all thi
s. AH ANY TIME CK
POISED ON THE GREAT THRESHOLD May We Speak?
POISED! BURNING SAPPHO TEETERS ON THE BRINK
OF BEING DIPPED IN PERMANENT BLACK INK
Right now? This minute? NO I’VE WANGLED ONE
NIGHT WITH MY SANTINO ON THE TOWN
Tomorrow then. How odd…WYSTAN’S BEHAVIOR
I MUST SAY HAS BEEN THAT HARDLY A NOD
IN ONE’S DIRECTION SULKING OVER L?
Chester, he, all of us, have been through— WELL
BLESS HIM NOW JO’BURG & 12 MORTAL YEARS
TILL PUBERTY SCOUT KNOTS & RACE RELATIONS
BUT WE WILL RISE! SO CURIOUSLY TEMPTING
THE HURLYBURLY LUCA DROWNS IN TEARS
YAMS ANYONE? PLEASE NO MORE SOUL FOOD How
We’ll miss you! We’d imagined— I KNOW CIAO
DJ jumps up: I’ll be back. Hold the fort—
Clatters downstairs. Faint slam of car door. No
Need to ask. And now the phone— Hello?
That was George Cotzias in hospital
(No, no, just tests, all perfectly routine)
Proposing a quiet meal next month in town
Before DJ returns to Athens. Free
Advice, is my first thought. This man can tell
What of the “scientific” Mirabell
Makes sense, if any. Only then the fear:
Who but our eminent new friend was meant
The other day by CERTAIN HIGHLY CLONED
SCIENTIST SOULS forced back from the frontier?
His work is being thwarted? By God B?
Questions I mostly shy away from, pained
To read in the developing event
More than a date broken or postponed.
9.8
Light the candles. This last supper’s meat
Is the imperial beet,
Green salad, Vermont cheddar. Grape juice brings
To mind a young Château. What would the right
Music be? Some ruminative suite
(Unwritten) for five strings
Tuned to a fare-thee-well. Lamplight
The Changing Light at Sandover Page 28