You’ll meet a wingèd Lion. MR R SAYS ALSO
4 OF THOSE I WAS FORERUNNER TO!
The golden horses on St Mark’s—indeed.
AT THE HEDGE MISS ALICE SAID I WOULD HAVE
A STRAW HAT IF I WOULD BE HER STEED.
‘GERTRUDE, YOU KNEW I WAS A RIDER?’
‘A WRITER?’ ‘NOT QUITE: AN EQUESTRIENNE!’
Well, as you know, we sail two days from now.
YES! THIS IS UNICE SAYING CIAO
& MAMAN SAYING BASTA TO THIS DREAM
SHE LONGS TO WAKE FROM WD THAT THE GRAND SCHEME
LET A MIRROR NOW & THEN MATURE
INTO A SIMPLE PIECE OF FURNITURE
She’s tired of us. (It’s late, we’re on the terrace
Watering.) From Maria’s point of view
This work’s done. Her next one takes on weight
And character halfway around the world.
With birth so near, an ordinary soul
Would be in situ, and unreachable—
Not she. She’s learned that kid stuff inside out.
At most, like Sounion, she comes and goes,
Gardens, has lunch, a little nap, but knows
Better than to spend the night there—nipping
Back to heavenly Athens while she can!
(Laughter. Gurglings from the hose, and heat
Delicious through wet flagstones to bare feet.)
DJ: When we first met Emmanuel
Nearly eight months ago, Maria told us
That she “experienced her mother’s womb”.
JM: She was conceived then? Po-po-po!
DJ: Or as a two-week fetus had been sent
To check the room out, before Management
Put itself to any further trouble.
(Laughter. The ninth moon setting—at whose full
Enormous turtles, barnacled like moons,
Eggs buried in the lap of silver dunes,
Regain the ebbing world they mustn’t fail.)
JM: Plato appears in Mirabell
First as a sex-fiend, squinting through keyholes
At slim young bodies; then we get his later
Liaison with Luca. The Tibetan
Book of the Dead reports that apparitions
Of copulating figures may beset
The pilgrim soul. Surrendering to them
Means the long road taken back to Earth.
(If we’re still laughing now, it’s at the motley
Worn by sober Truth. Then DJ aiming
The hose upright, from under his thumb streams
Fanwise, heavenward a ghostly jet
Whose fallout tickles lifted faces wet.)
Turn it off. Another day. Sweet dreams
—But who has plucked my sleeve?
An old arthritic Cassia shrub one March
Glimpsed by Maria from the car
And, dug up wild, brought home. A “sensitive”,
Its leaves are folded in the night, a dim
Green gooseflesh along every limb
Tells of the coming fit:
Another fifteen days will see
The stunted twiggery
Robed in oracular yellow head to foot.
Tonight it has just this to say:
I too, O sonneteer,
Was marked, transported by her, and this year
Given a part to play.
*
Venetian Jottings
“Showing a film of Maya’s!” shouts DJ
Across the Piazza. JM shuts his Dante.
Which film? “Who knows? I got seats anyway.
Tonight at nine. Part of some sort of anti-
Biennale thought up by the students, bless
Their hearts.” Amen. Thank Heaven we’re not twenty.
It’s morning still. The tourist’s merciless
Fun-ethic has been goading us all week
From gondola to gallery, from princess
To restaurant, from poolside to boutique.
Today’s gray drizzle comes as a reprieve,
Affording a noon hour in which to speak
With the invisible companions we’ve
Brought to this drowning, dummy paradise
Whose nude, gnawed Adam and eroded Eve
Cling to their cornice, and September flies
Revolve above the melting tutti-frutti.
One happy shade at least feels otherwise:
AWASH MY DEARS POLLUTED BY THE BEAUTY!
(We’ve set our Board up on the kitchen table
At David Kalstone’s, back of the Salute.)
GERTRUDE & WALLACE WINDOWSHOP, UNABLE
TO FIND A PREWAR GONDOLIERE HAT.
UNI INCONSOLABLY HAUNTS THE STABLE,
HIS LONGLOST GILT BRONZE COUSIN LAID OUT FLAT
AMONG HEADSHAKING VETS. RM WE FEEL
KEEPS UP THE ‘TONE’ BY FLITTING LIKE A BAT
BELFRY TO BELFRY: ‘ONE GRAND GLOCKENSPIEL’
GK APPALLED TESTS THE CANAL: ‘DO NOT
TOUCH A DROP OF THESE REFLECTIONS!’ HE’LL
LEARN ENFANTS. MD ALL STAGEFRIGHT: ‘WHAT
TO WEAR TO MY PREMIERE?’ And Maman—you?
SHAWLED IN BLACK OVER THE PASTA POT
Hans? Alice? Marius?—but Luca who
Is DK’s patron, as we now recall,
Darts forward: BELLO! BELLO SEMPRE DI PIU!
VOGLIO CON LUI FAR L’INCESTO! All
On hand, in short, and eager for good times.
(Another morning, after a bad squall,
There in full view is Peggy Guggenheim’s
Waterlogged gondola. MY DEARS OF COURSE
WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN EVERYBODY CLIMBS
ABOARD 12 SHADES, A PEACOCK & A HORSE!
Who was the twelfth? PYTHAGORAS HE WENT
DOWN WITH THE SHIP And so on.) Not to force
The issue, but if this is all they meant
By GO OUT LAUGHING…Now at twilight here’s
Our old resounding bridge. Indifferent
Both to high spirits and fall sightseers,
It waits for winter lightning’s coup de grâce,
The solving gales. I know; in not three years
Since the great cloudburst turned me to a glass
Model of stamina—but where is Wendell?—
My sand and water chafe. Here’s an impasse
Deep in which red flickerings enkindle
More than curiosity. The street-
At-evening’s densely peopled Coromandel
Panel folds back upon a blast of heat
So powerful we’ve paused: it’s the glass-blowing!
A glory hole roars, pulses. Color of peat
Artisans dip the long rod into glowing
Pots, fire within fire, gasping conflate
Ember with embryo, by rote foreknowing
—Much as they twirl, lop, tweezer at a rate
Swifter than eyesight—the small finished form.
Twice more we watch the rose-hot blob translate
Itself to souvenir, to hardly warm
Bud-vase or pony, harlequin or bird—
Its newfound cool no refuge from the storm
Of types—and can move on. Here’s the dust-furred
Fleabag cinema. An unsmiling speaker
Asks that to “bourgeois discourse” be preferred
The “radical mutism” of the image-
maker.
(Are these the latest terms? I simply gawk.)
At last lights dim. Drums gibber. Credits flicker.
A bare beach. Glinting wavelets—the sidewalk
Colorist in each of us ransacks
His box for that jade-green or azure chalk
Lost among dialectic whites and blacks.
Then sunset, hills, a road, a figurine
Ambling past. Action slowed by the soundtrack’s
Treacherous crosscurrent, if not swept clean
Away by particles that so bombard,
So flay an image to the bone-white screen
That vision ducks too late and winces, scarred.
It is the flak fired outward from time’s core.
Now they’ve assembled. Shirtsleeved houngan. Hard
Dirt of the ceremonial dance floor
Where in white meal he traces Erzulie’s
Curlicue-and-checker heart, the four
Chambers strewn with grain. Held above these
A (peck) dazed hen (peck-peck) greed overcomes.
Will the gods accept it? Silence. Freeze:
The headless, blood-slimed bird. Then again drums,
Faces, feet. The counterclockwise drain
Of chanted phrase on equilibriums
Until it happens. Ghédé with his cane,
Smoked glasses and top hat struts avenues
No one else sees. Through flurries of cocaine
The youth he’s mounted sizzles like a fuse.
A woman pitches, is held up, advances
Pale and contorted—but it’s Maya! (Who’s
Holding the camera?) Next we know, her trance has
Deepened, she is combed, perfumed and dressed
In snowy lace, beaming at whom she fancies.
The frown, the flood of tears, and all the rest
Will have been cut, or never filmed. Delight
Alone informs her dance, unself-possessed.
Partner by partner, David’s face goes white:
We are the ghosts, hers the ongoing party
At which she was received one summer night
(How many years ago now, twenty? thirty?)
Into the troupe, glowworm and lunar crescent,
That whole supreme commedia dell’ arte
Which takes a twinkling skull for reminiscent
Theatre, and soul for master negative.
It’s Maya dancing. She is here and isn’t,
Her darks print out as bright, her dyings live
—Do they? In Venice’s uncomprehending
Eyes? Painful to think, hard to forgive
What “today” makes, what “Paradise” impending
Will, if a trace remains, of…Let that be.
One last shot: dawn, the bare beach. “Happy ending?”
Smiles DJ as we link arms, tacitly
Skipping the futuristic coffee-bar’s
Debate already under way (ah, me)
On the confusing terms: Dance, Gods, Time, Stars.
*
Exits and Entrances
JUNGLES! QUITE BEAUTIFUL I’M SURE BUT O THE DISORDER! A CHAOS OF SORTS!
(Is it Herself? The cup darts to and fro—
Intermezzo marked prestissimo.
Outdoors, cars honk like geese, the very sun
Heads south. We’re back in Athens. Fall’s begun.)
CITIES, FORESTS, THESE WE KNOW ABOUT, MUCH THINNING TO COME IN THE FORMER, BUT JUNGLES!
WHO CAN COUNT THE LIVES THERE? CAN I? NO, IN A WORD. O THERE’S MUCH TO BE DONE!
POET, THINK ON THAT WHEN YOU GO LIKE A FOX TO EARTH, HAH! & REPORT TO ME, ME!
NOW COME ALONG MY DEAR, SO SORRY ABOUT INDIA BUT WE CAN’T ALL HAVE DISHWASHERS & ELECTRICAL GADGETS I’M SURE!
BEAT YOUR SERVANTS, THEY’LL WORSHIP YOU!
YOU OTHERS, LOOK ALIVE! MUCH TO DO! THE SUMMER TO GET UNDER WRAPS!
AU RESERVOIR!
WHEW I UNDERSTAND NOW WHY MARIA
GOES ABOUT MUTTERING ‘BOMBAY, WHAT BLISS!’
Who’s this? ME GEORGE THE SAUCERS ARE I THINK
HER SPECTACLES TO KEEP THE WORLD IN FOCUS
Bombay. And you, George? JIMMY THEY’LL TAKE ME APART
THE OLD TIN WOODSMAN, LINKED FOREVERMORE
TO THAT AMAZING LAB OF GABRIEL’S
OR RATHER TO 18 LABS THRUOUT THE WORLD
AS ‘HELPER’: THIS CHART MISPLACED, THAT TESTTUBE CHANGING
COLOR RUINS THE EXPERIMENT
OR PROVES IT, LIGHTS BLINK OUT, THE CHIEF OF STAFF
STRICKEN WITH A MIGRAINE…I WILL BE
THE PURELY SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLE
And the creative. MAKING SENSE OF IT
The mirror breaks. What happens in those first
Minutes, can you say? SAY! WE’VE REHEARSED
MY BOYS FOR MONTHS. I’LL SHIFT THRU VEINS OF METAL
GETTING THE FEEL OF IT, THEN SURFACING
(AN IFFY MOMENT THERE WELL, WHAT IF SOME AFRICAN
DUSKY PICKS A BIG BRIGHT SPARKLER UP?
Easy—we’ll ask for you at Carrier’s.
CAFE SOCIETY SO UN-ME ALWAYS
MISSING ACT I AT THE OPERA) THEN INTO
THE WORLD A CLIFF? A BEACH? OUR WORK BEGINS:
COVERING THE SINS OF MULTITUDE
WE MARCH WE GRAINS OF SAND! Creating famine.
Time’s latest cover story tells it all—
“Nature’s Revenge: The Creeping Deserts”. INDEED
A COOL HALF MILLION THIS MONTH IN ETHIOPIA!
NO MORE APPALLING THAN THE CHEMICALS
U ATHENIANS BREATHE (MY BROTHERS TAKING
OVER YR LUNGS) & THEN MY DEARS WE SHAKE !
THEN IN A CENTURY OR SO UNITE,
STAGE SET FOR RAPHAEL’S NEW EPOCHMAKING
ALL STAR REVIVAL OF THE RAKE
AS A GARDEN TOOL: WE FROM THE ROYAL BOX
WATCHING ACT I, THE PROMPTER OUT OF SIGHT
WHISPERING ‘ADAM, THIS TIME GET IT RIGHT!’
ENFANTS THE NEW MOON, SAUCER FOR OUR CUP,
WHISPERS IT IS TIME TO SERVE US UP.
ON DJ’S 55TH Three days from now!
We’ve planned a party— Softly: SO HAVE WE
THE TIME IS NOW AT HAND HAND, LET IT BE
Then, as impenetrable feelings twine
Round and round us, tough as any vine:
JUNGLES? WE’LL THIN! THIN! THIN!
HOW I APPROVE OF DESERTS! NOTHING MOVES UNSEEN! IT NEVER RAINS!
NO, JUNGLES MUST BE THINNED AND WILL BE!
MICHAEL, EMMANUEL, CONFERENCE!
*
It never rains…At this eleventh hour
Two still-warm shades, finding our schoolroom door
Ajar, take refuge from the shock of Heaven.
Cal Lowell first: CHRIST ON MY WAY HERE 4
FAMILY PORTRAITS CAME TO DO I MEAN
LIFE? O MR AUDEN! A mild teacher,
Wystan strolls him past the spears of green
Chalk grass on every blackboard—Uni’s art-work,
Our Robert having urged the dear good creature
To develop “faculties”. We’re smiling when
In sweeps a new Maria, la Divina,
Callas herself, fresh from her greatest role:
THEY CALL THIS THE STAR’S DRESSING ROOM? THIS HOLE ?
—Whom Robert, himself heartsick, must console.
Maman, suppose we visited Bombay?
SHALL WE? (inst
ant complicity) DO WE DARE?
Going on recklessly to set the year
1991, the hour and day
And landmark in whose shade there will appear
A SCRUBBED 14 YEAR OLD PUNJABI LAD
CARRYING SOMETHING U WILL KNOW ME BY.
IS IT A DATE? You bet your life. (We’re mad.)
JIMMY GIVE MY LOVE TO YOU KNOW WHO
Without fail, George. MY ONE LIFE HAD TOO FEW
ATTACHMENTS YET IF LOVING’S 88
PERCENT IS CHEMICAL I ANTICIPATE
FORMING SOME STRONG NEW BONDS LIVE WELL MY FRIENDS
& COMFORTABLY ON THEIR DIVIDENDS!
9 MY DEARS? THE BIRTHING MONTH THE STAGE
B4 THE OVAL ENIGMA: LIFE’S INDRAWN
BREATH, THE BASIN WHERE OUR OLD SELVES DROWN.
ARABIC 9 (AS ON YR TRANSCRIPT PAGE)
FACE AVERTED FROM THE CIPHER LOOKS
BACK ON THE LONG ROAD TRAVELED. ROMAN IX
SERVES FOR US: ONE FOOTSTEP FROM THE CRUX
OF TIME WE STAND POISED WAITING TO LEAP IN
THE PARTY AT THE STATION WILL INCLUDE
ENFANTS 5 SILENT PRESENCES QM
& BROTHERS SO NO TEARS IN FRONT OF THEM.
WE’LL CHAT INFORMALLY BEFORE WE’RE CLAD
IN ‘TRAVELING DRESS’ & THE TRAIN CHUGS AWAY…
RM CAN FILL U IN ANOTHER DAY
Glimpses of the Future
When that day comes it’s we who’ll read aloud
The text, to Robert, of our grand farewell
Which he and Uni witness, but through glass:
A vague, dust-spattered shadow play; the music,
Vibration without pitch; our three departing
Figures here one moment, gone—light’s carriage
The Changing Light at Sandover Page 51