the needle slips
into the cloth
No one has remembered
to knot the thread
From the Neolithic
At the office till almost noon, and then broke up. Then came Sir G. Carteret, and he and I walked together alone in the garden, taking notice of some faults in the office, particularly of Sir W. Batten’s, and he seemed to be much pleased with me, and I hope will be the ground of a future interest of mine in him, which I shall be glad of. Then with my wife abroad, she to the Wardrobe and there dined, and I to the Exchange and so to the Wardrobe, but they had dined. After dinner my wife and the two ladies to see my aunt Wight, and thence met me at home. From thence (after Sir W. Batten and I had viewed our houses with a workman in order to the raising of our roofs higher to enlarge our houses) I went with them by coach first to Moorfields and there walked, and thence to Islington and had a fine walk in the fields there, and so, after eating and drinking, home with them, and so by water with my wife home, and after supper to bed.
Noon broke.
I walked alone, taking
notice of the ground—
a future of mine
which I shall be glad
to exchange,
raising our roof higher
to enlarge
our first moor.
I had a fine walk
in the fields—
the home I ate.
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Saturday 5 April 1662.
Sustenance
Under the scaffolding,
under the paint: erasure
upon erasure—
Everything may not
necessarily be
a test.
In response to Via Negativa: Currency.
Brief Panorama, with Flowering
The root pushes up green shoots.
In the lot at the end of the street, visible bands of magenta.
First the crepe myrtles, then the pale tree lilacs, then magnolias.
We exclaim at their suddenness, their exponential amends for absence.
I want just for the moment to think only of this—
Something like profusion, something like a surplus, please not soon taken away—
Not the effort it cost, not the blind tunneling through softening loam.
In response to Via Negativa: Have a nice day.
Night barge
By barge Sir George, Sir Williams both and I to Deptford, and there fell to pay off the Drake and Hampshire, then to dinner, Sir George to his lady at his house, and Sir Wm. Pen to Woolwich, and Sir W. Batten and I to the tavern, where much company came to us and our dinner, and somewhat short by reason of their taking part away with them. Then to pay the rest of the Hampshire and the Paradox, and were at it till 9 at night, and so by night home by barge safe, and took Tom Hater with some that the clerks had to carry home along with us in the barge, the rest staying behind to pay tickets, but came home after us that night. So being come home, to bed.
I was much troubled to-day to see a dead man lie floating upon the waters, and had done (they say) these four days, and nobody takes him up to bury him, which is very barbarous.
night barge
a dead man floating
on the water
Erasure haiku derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 4 April 1662.
[temporarily hidden by author]
In response to Via Negativa: Delusions...: the marksman.
Delusions of a erasure poet: the marksman
Rows of targets on the side of a barn with an arrow in every bull’s-eye. “An expert marksman must live here!” Or a fool who fires at random and paints a target where each arrow lands?
It’s difficult not to make sense—not to find meaning in words or see faces in the forest. The truth is that wherever an arrow lands, something like a bull’s eye opens. Bulls aren’t terribly perspicacious. Wherever one charges, something like an enemy crumples. It might be a matador’s cape or china in a shop, who knows? But the bull sees as well as he needs to and shits anywhere he wants. Let his B.S. dry out and you can burn it, use it to cook a can of beans.
A poet is more than just a fool or a bull-slinger, though. Our job is not simply to make sense, but to make it beautiful. That requires a selective kind of vision. You have to not only find the bull but also un-find it, and ultimately forget about it. Pastures are so much more beautiful if they haven’t been grazed.
Have a nice day
At home and at the office all day. At night to bed.
O, an ice
day—a night-
to-be.
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 3 April 1662.
Currency
Mr. Moore came to me, and he and I walked to the Spittle an hour or two before my Lord Mayor and the blewcoat boys come, which at last they did, and a fine sight of charity it is indeed. We got places and staid to hear a sermon; but, it being a Presbyterian one, it was so long, that after above an hour of it we went away, and I home and dined; and then my wife and I by water to the Opera, and there saw “The Bondman” most excellently acted; and though we had seen it so often, yet I never liked it better than to-day, Ianthe acting Cleora’s part very well now Roxalana is gone. We are resolved to see no more plays till Whitsuntide, we having been three days together. Met Mr. Sanchy, Smithes, Gale, and Edlin at the play, but having no great mind to spend money, I left them there. And so home and to supper, and then dispatch business, and so to bed.
I walk to the spit
to hear the water, seen
so often—
like gone money
left in a bed.
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 2 April 1662.
Interruptions of the actual
In which finally the warm cast of sunlight pierces the skin around the heart.
In which we discuss how many cups of water are typically poured for one bath.
In which I try to explain how history is never absent; or how I am still learning not to flinch every time someone says a name which is my name yet not my name.
In which we are called to the jury window but cannot reveal to the person sitting next to us what has just now come over us with sadness.
In which the child walking with his mother down the sidewalk runs to a clump of blooms and excitedly chants yel-low yel-low.
In which the animal behind the wire fence comes up to take the cube of sugar and I want to ask of it my fortune, my not-yet-spent.
In which I measure the space between my thighs and wonder at the hinges in accommodation.
In which, arriving home late afternoons, somewhere in the steps taken between laundry machine and sink and pantry, the body resigns its dreams of rest.
In which I arrive at the conclusion that the word Mother is not a factory or threshing floor, not vessel or raft, not well, not cavity, but something more: I have no name for what is infinitely and always open to the elements.
In which I smooth the sheet and affix my signature.
In which I dust the charred heads of my wooden gods and line them up by the sill, because whatever crouches in so little space must crave any form of expanse.
In response to an entry from the Morning Porch.