Tipping point

God will not keep to the outside of the skin: what we call holy lives beyond sight, in letters forming the unpronounceable name of the child who fled her birth country, her home on a street lined with dove wings and olive trees, to be pulled into a boat in the middle of the night. The craft was full of strangers, but in the center of their own anguish they made space for her and those like her for whom the world could no longer be explained or soothed with sleep. Critics say it is irrelevant, that it has nothing to do with the plastic and fiberglass forms of bodies that line the downtown glass displays: identical wrists and hands swiveled in the same direction, insteps arched and bolted to the floor. But it lives in the eye of the doctor standing in line at a coffee shop, who feels the wet offending sling of spit land on his brown face, at the beginning or end of a rain of epithets; and in the trembling of the girl whose hijab is pulled off her head as she walks to school, as the man who steps in her path flicks his lighter open and threatens to burn her. Go back, hisses the parent of the child to the high school teacher who can do mathematics in more than one language. Sometimes my hands are hot, my hands are cold. They’ve counted and counted and now they’ve run out of lives to give away for free. Through it all the moon keeps coming closer, blooming larger: wineskin filled with bullets or poems or hail. Something is coming. Or something is here. We are told this is the best time to sing.

 

In response to Via Negativa: Seeker.

Seeker

Up, and being ready then abroad by coach to White Hall, and there with the Duke, where Mr. Coventry did a second time go to vindicate himself against reports and prove by many testimonies that he brought, that he did nothing but what had been done by the Lord Admiral’s secretaries heretofore, though he do not approve of it, nor since he had any rule from the Duke hath he exceeded what he is there directed to take, and the thing I think is very clear that they always did take and that now he do take less than ever they did heretofore.
Thence away, and Sir G. Carteret did call me to him and discourse with me about my letter yesterday, and did seem to take it unkindly that I should doubt of his satisfaction in the bargain of masts, and did promise me that hereafter whatever he do hear to my prejudice he would tell me before he would believe it, and that this was only Sir W. Batten’s report in this business, which he says he did ever approve of, in which I know he lies.
Thence to my Lord’s lodgings thinking to find Mr. Moore, in order to the sending away my letter of reproof to my Lord, but I do not find him, but contrary do find my Lord come to Court, which I am glad to hear and should be more glad to hear that he do follow his business that I may not have occasion to venture upon his good nature by such a provocation as my letter will be to him.
So by coach home, to the Exchange, where I talked about several businesses with several people, and so home to dinner with my wife, and then in the afternoon to my office, and there late, and in the evening Mr. Hollyard came, and he and I about our great work to look upon my wife’s malady, which he did, and it seems her great conflux of humours, heretofore that did use to swell there, did in breaking leave a hollow which has since gone in further and further; till now it is near three inches deep, but as God will have it do not run into the bodyward, but keeps to the outside of the skin, and so he must be forced to cut it open all along, and which my heart I doubt will not serve for me to see done, and yet she will not have any body else to see it done, no, not her own mayds, and so I must do it, poor wretch, for her. To-morrow night he is to do it.
He being gone, I to my office again a little while, and so home to supper and to bed.

where in the clear hereafter
is the Lord’s lodging

I do not find him in nature or malady
flux or break

God will not keep
to the outside of the skin

forced to open a heart
to see anybody else


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Monday 16 November 1663.

Crusaders

(Lord’s day). Lay very long in bed with my wife and then up and to my office there to copy fair my letter to Sir G. Carteret, which I did, and by and by most opportunely a footman of his came to me about other business, and so I sent it him by his own servant. I wish good luck with it. At noon home to dinner, my wife not being up, she lying to expect Mr. Holyard the surgeon. So I dined by myself, and in the afternoon to my office again, and there drew up a letter to my Lord, stating to him what the world talks concerning him, and leaving it to him and myself to be thought of by him as he pleases, but I have done but my duty in it. I wait Mr. Moore’s coming for his advice about sending it. So home to supper to my wife, myself finding myself by cold got last night beginning to have some pain, which grieves me much in my mind to see to what a weakness I am come. This day being our Queene’s birthday, the guns of the Tower went all off; and in the evening the Lord Mayor sent from church to church to order the constables to cause bonfires to be made in every streete, which methinks is a poor thing to be forced to be commanded.
After a good supper with my wife, and hearing of the mayds read in the Bible, we to prayers, and to bed.

business is a holy urge
no thought or weakness

our guns went all off
and from church to church
bonfires made of prayer


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Sunday 15 November 1663.

Fade

“…how one feels a small life’s shortness.” ~ Rilke, “Blue Hydrangea”

Yet in this minuscule, this easily
overlooked space, we held the packed
wardrobes of those who’ve left

their previous lives— Little to carry
in the coming across: a coat, trousers,
two good shirts, a pair of handkerchiefs,

a pocket watch. Good shoes, a skirt,
a dress for Sunday best, hooped earrings
fashioned from a melted-down inheritance.

For wasn’t the world made of its materials?
And in our letters, we catalogued the parks,
and somewhere in the drifting in-between

the keen salt-note of the sea. Astonishment
of trees that shed change like wealth,
sure of return in so many ways we

could never be. While we, like misers,
hoarded every small bloom against uncertain
futures, until they faded or shrank away.

In bad faith

Up and to the office, where we sat, and after we had almost done, Sir W. Batten desired to have the room cleared, and there he did acquaint the board how he was obliged to answer to something lately said which did reflect upon the Comptroller and him, and to that purpose told how the bargain for Winter’s timber did not prove so bad as I had reported to the board it would. After he had done I cleared the matter that I did not mention the business as a thing designed by me against them, but was led to it by Sir J. Minnes, and that I said nothing but what I was told by Mayers the surveyor as much as by Deane upon whom they laid all the fault, which I must confess did and do still trouble me, for they report him to be a fellow not fit to be employed, when in my conscience he deserves better than any officer in the yard. I thought it not convenient to vindicate him much now, but time will serve when I will do it, and I am bound to do it. I offered to proceed to examine and prove what I said if they please, but Mr. Coventry most discreetly advised not, it being to no purpose, and that he did believe that what I said did not by my manner of speaking it proceed from any design of reproaching them, and so it ended. But my great trouble is for poor Deane.
At noon home and dined with my wife, and after dinner Will told me if I pleased he was ready to remove his things, and so before my wife I did give him good counsel, and that his going should not abate my kindnesse for him, if he carried himself well, and so bid “God bless him,” and left him to remove his things, the poor lad weeping, but I am apt to think matters will be the better both for him and us.
So to the office and there late busy. In the evening Mr. Moore came to tell me that he had no opportunity of speaking his mind to my Lord yesterday, and so I am resolved to write to him very suddenly.
So after my business done I home, I having staid till 12 o’clock at night almost, making an end of a letter to Sir G. Carteret about the late contract for masts, wherein I have done myself right, and no wrong to Sir W. Batten.
This night I think is the first that I have lain without ever a man in my house besides myself, since I came to keep any. Will being this night gone to his lodging, and by the way I hear to-day that my boy Waynman has behaved himself so with Mr. Davis that they have got him put into a Barbadoes ship to be sent away, and though he sends to me to get a release for him I will not out of love to the boy, for I doubt to keep him here were to bring him to the gallows.

we are obliged to answer a troll
told how winter did not prove
so bad as reported

or that he had no opportunity
of speaking his mind

till 12 o’clock at night
making an end of right and wrong
out of love for the gallows


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 14 November 1663.

Landscape in an afterlife

Someone was running at night
and someone was being picked up.
The dunes glowed in the distance,
from one end of the world to the other,
like a border. We knew there were others
on the other side. We could hear
their chants, see the smudge-lines
of smoke from their fires. Every step
filled our shoes with sand. We were always
trying to run toward each other. The air
smelled of sulfur and the granular residues
suspended in the air after cities had burned
into ghosts. Why did we even want to look
for signs of stars and planets gone
into hiding in the dark?

Apocalypso

[Late Latin apocalypsis, from Greek apokalupsis, revelation; apocalypse, from apokaluptein, to uncover : apo-, apo- + kaluptein, to cover; see kel- in Indo-European roots.]

Draw the heavy velvet drapes open,
see the moon’s pockmarked marble

darkly floating in the sky: perigee-
syzygy, disco ball rising on invisible

pulleys up the dome of this all-night
discotheque where we’ve come to dance

while looking furtively over one
twitchy shoulder every five minutes…

And we don’t know, we don’t know,
despite the floodlights spilling

on our heads, just how the next act
plays out. Lift the veil, a voice

cries out. But we’re too mired in
the music; and it’s almost better

just to close our eyes and press
deeper into our partners’ arms.

D.T.

Up and to my office, busy all the morning with Commissioner Pett; at noon I to the Exchange, and meeting Shales, he and I to the Coffee-house and there talked of our victualling matters, which I fear will come to little. However I will go on and carry it as far as I can.
So home to dinner where I expected Commissioner Pett, and had a good dinner, but he came not. After dinner came my perriwigg-maker, and brings me a second periwigg, made of my own haire, which comes to 21s. 6d. more than the worth of my own haire, so that they both come to 4l. 1s. 6d., which he sayth will serve me two years, but I fear it.
He being gone, I to my office, and put on my new shagg purple gowne, with gold buttons and loop lace, I being a little fearful of taking cold and of pain coming upon me. Here I staid making an end of a troublesome letter, but to my advantage, against Sir W. Batten, giving Sir G. Carteret an account of our late great contract with Sir W. Warren for masts, wherein I am sure I did the King 600l. service.
That done home to my wife to take a clyster, which I did, and it wrought very well and brought a great deal of wind, which I perceive is all that do trouble me. After that, about 9 or 10 o’clock, to supper in my wife’s chamber, and then about 12 to bed.

fear me
I will go as far as I can

I am more than my hair
that gold cold wind


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 13 November 1663.

Allegory for ___

The dentist’s assistant explains
to the trainee that I have a small
mouth
. Together, they maneuver

the plastic-sheathed wand tipped
with a circle into my open mouth.
This works like a crosshair—

They fire a short X-ray burst through it,
talking as they work. I am of course
awake. There is sensation in my jaw;

I feel the pull from the retractor.
& Of course it’s hard to talk or answer
back, above the buzz of instruments.

Graveyard shift

Lay long in bed, indeed too long, divers people and the officers staying for me. My cozen Thomas Pepys the executor being below, and I went to him and stated reckonings about our debt, for his payments of money to my uncle Thomas heretofore by the Captain’s orders. I did not pay him but will soon do it if I can.
To the office and there all the morning, where Sir W. Pen, like a coxcomb, was so ready to cross me in a motion I made unawares for the entering a man at Chatham into the works, wherein I was vexed to see his spleene, but glad to understand it, and that it was in no greater a matter, I being not at all concerned here.
To the ‘Change and did several businesses there and so home with Mr. Moore to dinner, my wife having dined, with Mr. Hollyard with her to-day, he being come to advise her about her hollow sore place.
After dinner Mr. Moore and I discoursing of my Lord’s negligence in attendance at Court, and the discourse the world makes of it, with the too great reason that I believe there is for it; I resolved and took coach to his lodgings, thinking to speak with my Lord about it without more ado. Here I met Mr. Howe, and he and I largely about it, and he very soberly acquainted me how things are with my Lord, that my Lord do not do anything like himself, but follows his folly, and spends his time either at cards at Court with the ladies, when he is there at all, or else at Chelsy with the slut to his great disgrace, and indeed I do see and believe that my Lord do apprehend that he do grow less too at Court.
Anon my Lord do come in, and I begun to fall in discourse with him, but my heart did misgive me that my Lord would not take it well, and then found him not in a humour to talk, and so after a few ordinary words, my Lord not talking in the manner as he uses to do; I took leave, and spent some time with W. Howe again, and told him how I could not do what I had so great a mind and resolution to do, but that I thought it would be as well to do it in writing, which he approves of, and so I took leave of him, and by coach home, my mind being full of it, and in pain concerning it. So to my office busy very late, the nights running on faster than one thinks, and so to supper and to bed.

we pay for the morning
in unaware work

day is a hollow dance
the world makes

my heart give me
a few ordinary words

but do it in writing
the nights run faster than ink


Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 12 November 1663.