The Subversive
1953

"To Whom It May Concern: The white paintings came first; my silent piece came later." - John Cage

October onlookers
discomfited by white--
by shadows rising from white,
by the intrinsic recognition
that the shades of this life
are overtaken too soon
and conquered by those of the After.
Onlookers with Expectations of Beauty
or of an Afternoon’s Escape
instead greet Seven Specters
with fingers pointing
the predictable path to the grave
Seven Specters address
the inevitability of death.
Seven specters and
who understood this primal disquietude?
Fire and ice are so very nice
But oh to be pursued by shadows,
to give into temptation,
surrender to cool white.
The critics shook their heads
only Cage had an answer...
4’33 minutes
of silence.

A most interesting perspective the work of Rauschenberg:

http://www.tate.org.uk/tateetc/issue8/erasuregenteel.htm

Leaves of Grass

I’ve seen the ghosts at Gettysburg,
spirits of heroes mown down in their youth
in sacrifice celebrated by Whitman,
the poet prescient in his vision of
atoms and blood-fed grass.

I’ve seen the ghosts at Gettysburg,
young men swept away
by love of country
or love of God,
ghosts whose father mother sister brother
comb the fields in attitudes of desperation,
whose wives and sweethearts
weep away their beauty
as they wander the graves
in search of truth.

I’ve seen the ghosts at Gettysburg
Rebel and Fed
called forth by tears.
They rise through the miasma
greet one another in the haze,
greet one another in blades of grass
atoms mingling,
greet one another as kindred spirits,

as confraternal souls

destined forever to walk

as ghosts at Gettysburg.

(Image: The Battle of Gettysburg, 1884, Paul Dominic Philippoteaux.)

Gettysburg, July 5, 1863

And still they come
mothers and daughters
disconsolate sisters
lovers condemned by moira
to lives of

unbroken spinsterhood

Still they come
carrying armloads of lilacs

burying grief-ravaged faces
in bouquets of hyacinth and fading rosebuds
breathing deeply
as if to obliterate
the stench of death
while the image remains
indelible
Still they come
weeping weaving
sleepwalkers in shock

their dreams
lie dead upon the field

yesterday's bride looks on her beloved

covers her womb

hands unconsciously protecting

her unborn son

from the monstrosity

that would have been his father

can even heaven rejoin

this unholy mess?
Still they come
ears attuned only to the wind
listening for last words
scattered unheard
blistered hands dig through
pockets and dirt
search for memento mori
a blood-stained letter, “My Dearest”

a comb
a scrap of a hymn “Are You Ready?“
desperate hands

dig into hecatomb

seeking only assurance
that their heroes have died
a good death.


(Image: Confederate dead gathered at the edge of Rose Woods for burial, Gettysburg battlefield, July 5, 1863, by Timothy H. O'Sullivan)

Negative Capability

I have given up Hyperion
Thus Keats washed his hands
of identity and certainty,
of the Niggling Encumbrances
that gnaw at the psyches
of Small Minded Men.
Enlightened Hyperion,
A GOD WHO KNEW...
but to what purpose?
Fear of death and darkness,
Endless brooding
on the fall of Saturn.

Meanwhile the Titan thumbed his nose
at the hapless Englishman
and thought back to own celebrity
in the days when the sun and stars
adorned the wrists of the gods.
He might have dabbled in dreams--
far better to become
a pillar than a poet,
to raise the universe
with brute force purchased
at the cost of his father's manhood.


I have given up Hyperion
Keats closed his eyes to the sun,

found lurking in shadow
the substance of Truth,
the weight of Beauty,
a universe free
of that which bound the masses.
Keats celebrated UNKNOWING,
bid adieu to self,
Became.

(Image: M.C. Escher, Three Worlds)

The most common
form of suicide
is committed by Everyman
done in by
neverending performance
of social niceties…





Shallow Conversations
Liberally Peppered
with WonderfulMarvelous
OhHowNice.
the distressed soul,
AllIsWelled to death
One too many
Forays into
Congeniality
and it’s a Willing Plunge
into a grave dug deep
by Platitude.

(Image: Joseph Cornell, Inkblot)

Graduation Day

Put on your silver dancing shoes
and waltz across the floor
the rabble grows impatient
but Life will wait
while you steel your soul.

Stars on the wall
take one with for luck.
Beyond the door
a dark abyss--
a what's-next crossed with wires,
foreboding but in the distance
Life shines.

Philip Larkin

Train Wreck*

Who knows when you lost the muse--
maybe it started to go

back in nineteen-sixty-three,
along with your virginity
and the scratched up
Beatles album.
Maybe the first time
you heard Bechet’s stick…
Was the voice that fell like love
the inception of your silence?
Pure bliss to give birth to such noise
but the closest you came
was the poetry of the gutbucket
and so those evenings spent
with Kingsley
Ginned up at the pub
Staggering back to Monica
and the House on Hull…
Trampling the frail cut grass
Dreaming of the Bayou

while baying at the moon

over the imminent white hours of death.

*Train wreck: Event during the playing of a tune when the musicians "disagree" on where they are in the form (i.e. someone gets lost), so the chord changes and the melody may get confused for several bars, but depending on the abilities of the musicians (it happens to the best of them), there are usually no fatalities and the journey continues.