Purveyors of fine poetry since 2003.
What place is this
that sings alone
half devoured
by some spiteful air
what city spreads
such emptiness
Quel est ce lieu
qui chante tout seul
à demi rongé
d’un air mauvais
quelle ville autour
s’étend déserte
Untitled poem by Jacques Brault.
Photo: Camberwell Old Cemetery, half devoured.
More photos at Gnarled Oak.
Up betimes, and about eight o’clock by coach with four horses, with Sir J. Minnes and Sir W. Batten, to Woolwich, a pleasant day. There at the yard we consulted and ordered several matters, and thence to the rope yard and did the like, and so into Mr. Falconer’s, where we had some fish, which we brought with us, dressed; and there dined with us his new wife, which had been his mayde, but seems to be a genteel woman, well enough bred and discreet.
Thence after dinner back to Deptford, where we did as before, and so home, good discourse in our way, Sir J. Minnes being good company, though a simple man enough as to the business of his office, but we did discourse at large again about Sir W. Pen’s patent to be his assistant, and I perceive he is resolved never to let it pass.
To my office, and thence to Sir W. Batten’s, where Major Holmes was lately come from the Streights, but do tell me strange stories of the faults of Cooper his master, put in by me, which I do not believe, but am sorry to hear and must take some course to have him removed, though I believe that the Captain is proud, and the fellow is not supple enough to him. So to my office again to set down my Journall, and so home and to bed. This evening my boy Waynman’s brother was with me, and I did tell him again that I must part with the boy, for I will not keep him. He desires my keeping him a little longer till he can provide for him, which I am willing for a while to do.
This day it seems the House of Commons have been very high against the Papists, being incensed by the stir which they make for their having an Indulgence; which, without doubt, is a great folly in them to be so hot upon at this time, when they see how averse already the House have showed themselves from it.
This evening Mr. Povy was with me at my office, and tells me that my Lord Sandwich is this day so ill that he is much afeard of him, which puts me to great pain, not more for my own sake than for his poor family’s.
a falcon where we fish
simple as a master
I do not believe but must believe
in the supple art of folly
to see with an ear
to eat my own
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Friday 6 March 1662/63.
What does it mean, luck? Books of perforated lottery tickets sold by street waifs in the dusty plaza, outside church doors to catch the pious streaming out from mass. And then there’s Jueteng, from the Chinese Jue, flower; and teng, bet. A dog is 12, a cat is 26, a snake is 14. Whatever you dream, the cobrador can assign its mystical made-up number. Obliquely across the street from us, a bungalow ringed by concrete fence and concertina wire, where the numbers king of the north had set up a nice hideaway for his mistress, the mother of his child (#__). We saw her being pushed in her pram by uniformed nannies— Yellow layette and booties. Rattle that made a rattling sound before they disappeared again inside the gate. Select two numbers between 1 and 37 based on anything from the license plates of your political rival to the date of his planned assassination. When he ran for governor one election year, rampant rumors: snipers in the hedges, dark tinted cars closing in on our street. Father made arrangements for us to sleep overnight at a friend’s house on the other side of town: wormhole through which to slip away from gunfire. When we got there the drapes were drawn, but our host’s wife let me play a little on the piano, very softly. Or count the keys, she said. How many black? how many white? The hammers thudded with their little boots of felt.
The wing is only a mechanism,
much like a weight or an anchor.
Observe too how it doesn’t remain
dark anymore quite as long
as it used to. By the time
you get up, which is still
early, unseen birds
have cranked up a body of sound
in the trees. From across the bridge,
you see white stenciled shapes
moving in shallow water.
One summer many years ago,
visiting your grandfather’s farm:
you stepped without thinking
in a humid mound of dung.
You’d stopped for a long moment,
just watching cattle egrets on the mud-
caked backs of water buffalo.
Rose this morning early, only to try with intention to begin my last summer’s course in rising betimes. So to my office a little, and then to Westminster by coach with Sir J. Minnes and Sir W. Batten, in our way talking of Sir W. Pen’s business of his patent, which I think I have put a stop to wholly, for Sir J. Minnes swears he will never consent to it.
Here to the Lobby, and spoke with my cozen Roger, who is going to Cambridge to-morrow. In the Hall I do hear that the Catholiques are in great hopes for all this, and do set hard upon the King to get Indulgence. Matters, I hear, are all naught in Ireland, and that the Parliament has voted, and the people, that is, the Papists, do cry out against the Commissioners sent by the King; so that they say the English interest will be lost there. Thence I went to see my Lord Sandwich, who I found very ill, and by his cold being several nights hindered from sleep, he is hardly able to open his eyes, and is very weak and sad upon it, which troubled me much. So after talking with Mr. Cooke, whom I found there, about his folly for looking and troubling me and other friends in getting him a place (that is, storekeeper of the Navy at Tangier) before there is any such thing, I returned to the Hall, and thence back with the two knights home again by coach, where I found Mr. Moore got abroad, and dined with me, which I was glad to see, he having not been able to go abroad a great while. Then came in Mr. Hawley and dined with us, and after dinner I left them, and to the office, where we sat late, and I do find that I shall meet with nothing to oppose my growing great in the office but Sir W. Pen, who is now well again, and comes into the office very brisk, and, I think, to get up his time that he has been out of the way by being mighty diligent at the office, which, I pray God, he may be, but I hope by mine to weary him out, for I am resolved to fall to business as hard as I can drive, God giving me health.
At my office late, and so home to supper and to bed.
I have put on my hope
and voted against sand
hindered from sleep
hardly able to open eyes
I look at any road
and see no road
nothing is now
out of the way
but I am resolved
to drive
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Thursday 5 March 1662/63.
I too believed: not magic,
but the will of the mind yoked
to the merest prayer or wish.
In my heart, too many saints
before which votives were lit.
When my child languished in her bed
not wanting to live, with my own hands
I tore the bark from certain trees
and boiled them into tinctures
for her bath. In dreams, cruel oracles
spun wildly around the hearth, desperate
to guess our names. I climbed to the roof,
bonfire of wild fragments. I thrust
the hot iron of myself in the maw of night,
not caring anymore. Not backing down.
In response to Via Negativa: Sleeping on it.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/89056025@N00/25413842402
I turned 50 on February 24. The fact that I haven’t gotten around to mentioning it until now shows, I think, that I am completely fine with reaching this arbitrary milestone. Continue reading “50”
Piecing together the way a word
arrives on the threshold
and then maybe is followed
haltingly by another; how a memory
might hold a little water, the sound
of a particular morning long ago
when the child woke to a tumult
in the household. The way a hot wind
that comes in the middle of the day
reminds her of catastrophe
and ghosts standing behind
the drapery, mouthing tremors—
When she hears others talk
of the important work of poetry
she wants to exit the french doors
and sit on the balcony to throw
pieces of bread to the birds, to count
how many shirts are drying on the line.
Lay long talking with my wife about ordering things in our family, and then rose and to my office, there collecting an alphabet for my Navy Manuscript, which, after a short dinner, I returned to and by night perfected to my great content. So to other business till 9 at night, and so home to supper and to bed.
lay long
talking about order
a rose collecting
an alphabet
night perfected
at night
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Wednesday 4 March 1662/63.
(Shrove Tuesday). Up and walked to the Temple, and by promise calling Commissioner Pett, he and I to White Hall to give Mr. Coventry an account of what we did yesterday. Thence I to the Privy Seal Office, and there got a copy of Sir W. Pen’s grant to be assistant to Sir J. Minnes, Comptroller, which, though there be not much in it, yet I intend to stir up Sir J. Minnes to oppose, only to vex Sir W. Pen. Thence by water home, and at noon, by promise, Mrs. Turner and her daughter, and Mrs. Morrice, came along with Roger Pepys to dinner. We were as merry as I could be, having but a bad dinner for them; but so much the better, because of the dinner which I must have at the end of this month. And here Mrs. The. shewed me my name upon her breast as her Valentine, which will cost me 20s. After dinner I took them down into the wine-cellar, and broached my tierce of claret for them. Towards the evening we parted, and I to the office awhile, and then home to supper and to bed, the sooner having taken some cold yesterday upon the water, which brings me my usual pain. This afternoon Roger Pepys tells me, that for certain the King is for all this very highly incensed at the Parliament’s late opposing the Indulgence; which I am sorry for, and fear it will breed great discontent.
the promise of ivy
is to troll
though there be not much in it
to oppose only to vex
then promise to be bad for us
hew to the ache of noon
tell me
all I fear will breed
Erasure poem derived from The Diary of Samuel Pepys, Tuesday 3 March 1662/63.