The Second Half of the Double Feature, page 35
And my kingdom is really something to write home about.
Once upon a time there lived a Jewish carpenter . . . Do
You want me to tell you about him? Well believe then.
I hear your laughter as I walk the Sward. The sward of
Black, full-grown grass. There is no light and my soft
Foot-falls are silent in the night. Silent in the night.
I will come to you. Silent in
The night. And still you do not believe?
II.
My task is hard and it is a thankless, unfeeling one.
To spread the dark of blackness tries one’s patience.
The pickings seldom, if ever, live up to expectations.
However, I have picked you,
You, the proletariat. The third of the rotten whole.
The bottle must be broken at the bottom; to get the
Skim away from the cream.
The beautiful blue of the skim from the yellowish,
Billowing, fortunate cream.
It pours slowly into my vat.
I have a vat and it is large enough to encompass all
Of humanity. And then it will only be half full.
That includes the unborn and the dead.
Since the beginning of this.
This. The time that it began. The cycle with one end.
I am the ending of the cycle that has no middle or no
Beginning. I stand in front of the mirror and I can
Admire my beauty as no mortal could begin to. That is
Because I have no reflection.
No reflection of the things
That are. That are for you, but not for the man that is
Me. The cape of darkness is an ornament of clean and
Shining white when gazed upon in a mirror of one’s eyes.
My eyes see what they wish and want to see.
The things there are for me.
III.
O gentle night. O quiet scud of clouds and winds.
Sing Silent across my skies. Let me hear not the moaning and
The carelessness of singing.
Your beauty is but mine alone.
Turn not, my earth. I need the blackness for my calling.
When the earth turns not is when my disciples descend on me.
Then but not only then.
They dance with me in the bright
Sunlight, and in fancy clothes they cavort about my fountain.
It is then that I have to wear my rose-colored glasses.
Not because the sun hurts my eyes,
But because of my gentle heart.
O gentle night. Let them come to me through you. Alone I
Shall await them. My servants shall send them to my study.
Alone we shall appraise each other,
And they shall welcome the night.
I seem to hear the laughter of the proletarian masses.
I love and hate their laughter, because it is of me.
Yes, because it is of me.
IN THE TRUCK, IN THE BACK
These particles; microscopic rocks,
Pour through five fingers of
radiator steam.
Faces blend,
With green, black, brown, jolting
precision.
The jarringtilting movement
of steel and men:
Technicolor film, in a mad projector,
Cast on a screen of molten glass.
REFLECTION
Snow.
Frosted glass reflected in a mirror of eyes.
Light.
Squeezed prisms of green ironwood, impermeable.
Hands and feet.
Cordwood, stacked in the wind, inert and dead, bewildered.
Wind.
Blind, noisy, whispering feet, whipping through sound.
Rain.
A kid's B.B.’s stolen and scattered. Hear him crying?
The Cold.
My eyes run from it.
SCHEMATIC NUMBER 2
Sgt. Glenwell called me up on the radio and told me to bring him a couple of radio batteries. The kind that go on a quarter-ton. I chiseled a couple from the comm sergeant, put them on the back of my tank and we drove up to Glenwell. We had to drive through the woods for about two miles in order to get to him.
There were two dead heinies right along side of Glenwell’s tank. I didn’t say anything to my driver and he drove over them as we pulled up along side of Glenwell. It made Glenwell sore. He liked the expression in one of the heinies eyes he said, and besides he had to stay there and we didn’t. I passed him the batteries and we backed around so we could pull out again. Artillery started to come in. The heinies had heard the noise of my tank. One round landed right on top of the two dead heinies. The artillery stopped. I stuck my head out of the hatch and pointed to the scattered heinies.
“See Glenn,” I said, “It was inevitable.”
He shook his head.
“You’re the craziest bastard I ever seen.” Then he laughed and pulled his hatch shut.
I told my driver to move out and we left. We didn’t get any more artillery as we drove back through the woods.
IN A SIMPLE SEARCH FOR JUSTICE
In a simple search for justice,
I will find,
Greasy, green, and bloated maggots,
Stuffed into my mind.
In a simple search for justice,
I will find,
Married men, and burning faggots,
Pleasantly combined.
ANNIVERSARY
The sweet way you had,
Of touch and kiss.
The trite things you said
Yes. Of course. We must.
Race through my mind this day.
This day of ours,
That is now yours and mine.
THE TREE, THE SKY, THE SLEEPER
Trees from the sky, I have grown,
Hanging them high, upside down.
Large fearsome beasts, are the least
Things that I’ve seen, where I’ve been;
Lodged in my nest,
Upon the crest,
On rocks nestling, with problems wrestling.
SCHEMATIC NUMBER 3
Another soldier and I were on a six hour pass in Metz. We were drinking some watery beer in a little bar and somehow we got to talking about democracy. You can’t argue intelligently about democracy on beer, so we bought a quart of cognac for twelve hundred francs. I myself knew what democracy was all about, but the soldier I was with was a simple soul and wouldn’t believe my explanations. Finally I got an idea. I told the soldier to come with me. He grabbed the quart and we went down the street and crossed the bridge into where the town was a little more beat up. We finally arrived at the house. Outside of this house, in single file, were about eighty soldiers. There were colored truck drivers, white tankers, infantrymen and a couple of Moroccans, with red fezzes.
“See that line,” I said. “There are two whores in that house. Nice girls who came up from Paris to pick up a piece of change. That’s democracy.”
“I guess you’re right,” he said.
Then we got into the line.
I CRAWLED OUT OF THE HOLE and I found that I was a snake with pretty blue eyes and a smile like a skunk and I no longer needed my pack. (Who ever heard of a snake with a pack on its back?) I slithered into an abandoned jeep tire and wiggled around and around and around. . .
The driver came and looked at the tire.
He said, "It is good for another three hundred miles.”
He put it on the jeep and I went around and around . . .
The mud squished into my snake-ears.
The mushy, muddy road was soft on my breast.
I felt like I was getting somewhere.
The jeep stopped and I crawled out of the tire.
The place always reminded me of the name,
But I can’t remember names.
As a hoop I rolled down the broad highway.
As a rope I was skipped by little children.
God, but I was tired.
The damned road never ended.
A person would think that sure it has to
End at a river, a sea or something,
But it hasn’t ended yet.
THEATRE
Horses rampant danced upon the rocks
Set carelessly by those who did not care.
The first of those who came before
Was silent as the last who smiled.
O look, O laugh, O dream, O dance.
Raise your voices not, or louder still,
Turn them inwards to see the start
Of those who could but still would not.
This misfortune, is the setting.
Immediately will come the play.
All who are present will close the eyes
Of those who did not come.
The crackle of paper bags,
The crunch of the popcorn,
The dialogue will be.
WE, WILLEFORD, THE PEOPLE
Yes, it’s us all right
From all sides we hail the man on the horse,
The man in the motor car and the men in the ground.
Pass me the confetti already. (Please tear the pages
Out of the telephone book one at a time and
Don’t throw the entire book out.)
Hail the man on the bay with the bay and coming
Down the bay. And standing on the bay at bay.
Yes, it’s us all right.
That’s my girl. The third from the left.
Can’t you see that mole? Are you blind?
She’s the prettiest one in the whole line.
The one with the dimples and sincere smile.
With the footlights and all, it is hard to see
Her eyes. She is pretty nice, isn’t she?
Dammit man. Are you blind?
Yes, it’s us all right.
Throwing out two pieces of bread, with the same
String tied to each piece. Don’t those sea-gulls
Look funny? It’s so funny I’ll die
Laughing. Looky here. If you pull this little
Gadget off the fly he loses his balance and
He can’t fly. Works something like a gyroscope.
Did you get it? Gyroscope.
Yes, it’s us all right.
I do not like your manners, sir.
You have brushed against me and I demand
Satisfaction. All right, we will be gentlemen
About this small matter and we shall have a
Drink. A toast to our dear brother, (gulp)
You are quite right, sir.
Things always look better tomorrow.
Yes, it’s us all right.
Please be careful with that body over there.
It was a friend of mine. What do you mean,
Not so loud? There’s nobody listening. The
Purge is a physic, my friend. You always feel
Better. Just like a big, healthy, strong,
Smelly, grunting bowel movement. Sometimes
It feels like a hacksaw blade.
Yes, it’s us all right.
We, Willeford, The People.
The listeners, the doers, the diers, the dead.
SCHEMATIC NUMBER 4
I was standing in the turret eating a K-ration Breakfast unit. A Captain in a half-track pulled up along side of my tank and asked me what the score was. I told him. We were holding up in the shade of the buildings until the doughboys finished clearing the houses. He seemed satisfied with my answer. He was just sent up to find out what was holding up the column, not to do anything about it. Suddenly he said, “What’s that? Up there—looking out of the window!”
I looked at the window he was pointing to and I saw a flash of gray. I twisted my 50 around, pointed at the window and gave the window a burst of ten rounds. An old, grayheaded woman, cut almost in half, fell from the window and landed on the cobble-stones.
“It’s an old woman!” The Captain said.
I didn’t say anything. I was too embarrassed. I ducked inside the tank and told the crew what had happened, so they would know what the shooting was all about. I started to eat my K-ration again. The Captain turned around in the narrow street and drove back down the line.
I felt bad about that for several days.
PASSION AND PERMANENCE
Yes, we love today, but
Now it’s tomorrow.
The love in one kills
Love in the other.
Remember the night?
I had a blanket and I
kept throwing rocks at
the window until you sneaked
out of the house.
There in your curlers
and nightgown,
little blue slippers,
no make-up,
and the frightened love
burning in your eyes.
Good God. You were beautiful!
You sow. You, with your
Nasty Brat and puckered,
pouting lips.
How I hate you now!
The diaper smell when
I enter the house drives me wild.
And still, I can’t forget:
The night on the beach.
Wet and slick from seawater,
you slipped beneath the
comforter. Stars were
glistening in your hair
and you whispered,
You’re warm. Make me warm.
Make me warm.
No words can describe that night.
I can cry now.
And as I cry I remember.
Things that were, are gone.
Erased by cumulative knowingness.
The familiar fades and
Fading makes impervious,
The heart.
DEATH IS MY BROTHER
Forsaken, broken, dropped from the minds.
I quicken, sicken, flung with the winds,
Into despair, delight, fear, and light,
Again and again through the long night.
Death is my brother, fraternal fear,
Here in my loneliness, no one is near.
Brother of death, my brother of love,
I’ll laugh at last, when I come above.
EIGHT PANES OF GLASS
The first two are for the morning sun.
The second two are after it’s begun.
The third two are in the middle just above.
The last two are just in case of love.
All eight
Could just as well be slate.
For eight
Rocks, well placed, make a gate.
And with the night and sleep,
The pain of them is deep.
Shining, Silent, Forward, Striding,
Indifferent, Heedless, Caring, Hiding.
At Santa Anita, the horses . . .
Run . . . run . . . run . . .
SCHEMATIC NUMBER 5
I was standing at a bar in a bar in Paris and I heard another soldier down at the other end moaning. He was moaning about medals, combat, injustice, his pay and other sundry items.
I entered into the conversation because I thought I should straighten him out.
“Medals,” I began, “are for the soldier not the complainer. Combat is for the soldier, not the civilian in uniform. You are unfortunate but you are drafted so make the best of it. The army’s system of justice is just for the majority if not the minority. Even in Congress the majority rules so you have no complaint there. Your pay is enough for what you do. If you aren’t satisfied with your pay as a Private you should have gone to OCS while you were in the states. A Second Lieutenant makes a lot of money.”
The soldier studied his empty glass for a moment and replied. “A Second Lieutenant in the Infantry usually gets killed.”
“That is the only drawback,” I said, “but still life goes on in spite of dead Second Lieutenants. You are indeed fortunate that you are a live Private drinking cheap cognac in a cheap bar. Money to a dead Lieutenant isn’t much good.”
“Yes,” he said, “money isn’t everything.”
AND THEN THE FELLOW PULLED THE SHELL OFF THE SNAIL, and told me, See here, this is nature’s piss-poor attempt at rubber. And he stretched hell out of the snail.
And everywhere it is the same,
