Praise Song Sing
That cradles our bodies and turns them
Back to an attitude, a near-truth
Where measure is verbal architecture
and form is splendor.
2 is 1. Three is 1. 1 is one.
The thunder is above us. We are above thunder.
We are not the echo but the echo’s echo^∞.
Unlike the line, more often the cloud’s white—(tonight: puddle-dark).
A straight-star unlike light: unlike a crab
Looking up an apple tree.
I said 2 is 1, but couldn’t possibly understand
That Three is 1 or 1 is one
Unless I was unapproachable, inconsolable
From all-the-nights-in-Montauk or
Running west (although I didn’t know it was).
And God is like that: unhit and folds
Around the curve of our intent.
Did I mention any lack of restraint?
Any star for stars’ sake?
Octaves wander into the light-licked corners
Of each room in each house.
The sun is on the other side of the world
For a reason.
A dog hunches under my knees, which are under a desk.
I take that back.
I take everything I wrote back, I erase.
The cloud decides to keep the water.
The wind runs the cloud out of town for treason.
Our thunder knows
It is hot enough not to create a cloud
No matter how hard it hits the earth.
When lightning hits a house, it is not that
Lightning equals fire. Fire decides to start.
Fire has always been there waiting.
The Chinese symbol for heat looks like a rain cloud and its aftermath.
The Norwegian word for lightning is letthet.
David Letterman once said,
I cannot sing, dance or act; what else would I be but a talk show host.
In
Expect I die.
And he did.
Knows you know February in 1959 did something like February 2002.
We feel it in the cartilage.
We shrink inside ourselves upon another octave.
We think music can’t be like this: our bodies decide
The unwoven sound crashes against us unlike waves.
Pluck an eyelash and your eyelid slaps back into place.
Throw a rotten tooth into a pan like fool’s gold.
Let the dog lick your ankles because it loves you.
And don’t let sweet is sweet in any language bother you.