The Little Force

                     For Raymond Roussel and Yoichi Kawamura
                                Brothers in Heaven.

The child was still alive,
though he was once dead. The child
held the keys of hell and death
the last time the witnesses saw him
riding a small bicycle
near the park.

We split into search groups:
Leather Team (I)
& Velvet Team (II)

We searched all day without finding
anything but a dead crab in a plastic bag.
Velvet Leader stopped to draw circles
on various stones
to lure OUR HEAVENLY FATHER closer.

We knew if we passed this test
we should inherit all things,
assume a divinity of sorts, and incorporate this child
into the workings of our extended family system.

As the heat increased, the efficiency
of our team effort decreased. But there
was little point in dying from exertion. We assumed
a new division of labor without dissent or
murmur. We found some thrones and we
sat upon them. The Leather Team laid
hold of an old serpent
and bound him for 1000 years
as per their secret instructions.

The Velvet Team reported that the child's
mother had not returned to her home. We all
began to worry. She usually smokes about
twenty cigarettes a day so we searched the sky
for tell-tale clouds. No evidence was forthcoming.
We duly noted this in The Book of Eternal Life.
One witness described a pale horse ridden
by a rather sinister-looking fellow, with two others
following at a distance. We passed out
the supply of white robes to everyone in the
surrounding community. Suddenly the search was complicated

by an earthquake when roads, mountains
and islands were moved from their accustomed places.
We had been searching for 40 hours, and some
team members wished to take it easy. (Some
of them acted like blameless students, when in fact
they were already married!) We couldn't adopt
such a vague plan. "As long as you work
aimlessly, efficiency will never improve!
The glory and honor of our nation is at stake!" said a patch of wetness
                                          shimmering in air.

We waited by a tree-shaded river. Some
of us were healed while others behaved
rudely. Leather Leader felt some danger lurking
nearby. "The second woe is past, but the third woe
will come quickly," he whispered into his mike.
Fortunately, we found the child's name tag on a hill side,
but Velvet Leader quickly radioed back
that his team had discovered the child's
decapitated head in front of the gates
of the local junior high school! "There
is no excuse for this conduct!" we shouted. Leather Team
found this site conveniently close to the station
and immediately began significant videotaping.
Upon closer inspection we uncovered
a white stone, and in the stone a new name
written, which none of us could decipher.

We ascertained that the killer left the head
between 5 and 5:20 a.m. Tuesday morning.
We learned much from our failure, though
ironically, the child's head knew more about the workings
of this criminal's mind, where he dwelled, even
where his seat was, but it held fast his name
even after repeated questioning from our trained
interrogators, Alpha and Omega. In exasperation,
Omega struck the head, and three pieces
of blood-stained paper fell from
behind its curled tongue:

______________________________________________________________________________

Paper I

My mother fled into the wilderness
after the Great Dragon threatened her.
She found two eagle feathers beneath a ginkgo tree
& flew up among the stars, much like
a Chinese acrobat I had once seen
in Shanghai. The Great Dragon
was waiting for her there. He knelt
between her lifted knees
and pressed his mouth to her sex,
patiently awaiting my birth. Of course,
he wished to devour me as soon
as I was born...

______________________________________________________________________________

Paper II

You may call me The Great Dragon,
though no one knows my real name.
I can only find peace of mind
by killing this child over and over.
Indeed, I have the ability to kill
him in all 360 worlds! Do not feel
pity for this boy. He boasted once too often
that his father was a rich man. I saw
the face of his HEAVENLY FATHER and planned
my revenge. To tell the truth, I never
liked God's arrogant attitude. He always acted
in an overbearing manner in front
of His subordinates. I wore a mask of rain
and dressed in a light robe the color
of industrial pollution. I bought a saw
and a fish-gutting knife and hid them
under a white stone...then awaited my move...

______________________________________________________________________________

Paper III

Instructions: Copy these letters in your best handwriting, then send your copies to the appropriate
parties using the pre-printed envelopes included in your test packet.
            (You have 30 minutes to complete this section.)

To Leather Leader I, write:
           I know what you are doing and how patient you are and how you can't abide evil. I know how you have tested those that taste not death and found their predictions to be no more accurate than ours.
           For my name's sake keep working! If you stop I will quickly come and take those seven antique candlesticks you have stored in the back room. You won't know they are gone until you look for their reflection in a mirror. Then you will see the seven golden stars I have left in their place.

To Velvet Leader II, write:
           I am first and last in these matters.
(It...takes...me...a...while...to...complete...a...thought...because...I....alternate...between...death...
and...life.)
           I know what you are doing: your hard work, and your lack of money (though you are really rich), and I know that your team mates are inexperienced and consequently not much help in solving this case.
           But don't be afraid to let a stranger drive your car!
           And don't be afraid to watch over someone else's baggage!
           The plan is proceeding as scheduled, though you too are somewhat to blame.
           Now go your ways and pour out vials of blood upon the stones, and do not stop to talk to
the reporters who accost you in hoards.
           Though the climate is mild around there,
           do not play tag with a demon!
           Dress as a bride and maintain your exaggerated way of speaking.
           Be about to do.

______________________________________________________________________________

These words brought us
to our senses. We said nothing
to dampen the enthusiasm
of the crowd. We maintained
our spotless appearance
and secretly repented. Some of us
had strange dreams in which
the child came as a thief
but stayed to express various opinions
about alchemy. They gave him
a morning star destined to shine
in the East. He ruled them
with a rod of heated iron.
The little scamp left no traces behind
except that many of us reported
diarrhea, insomnia, nausea and fatigue
immediately upon waking.

The combined efforts of the Leather and Velvet
Teams turned up 100 possible clues. That night
we lit 100 candles at the cable television
tower on the hilltop. After we examined
each clue under a microscope, Leather and
Velvet Leaders took turns blowing out
the candles-one per hard bit of evidence. When
we were in total darkness we heard a car door
slam. Velvet Leader expressed fear, anxiety,
anger and grief. In response team members expressed
boredom, irritation, greed, lust and a general
nostalgia for the days when everything appeared
good and within the control of the average man or woman.

A heavy rain began to fall; we passed
an uneasy night. Right before dawn we opened
the 4th Seal and the Beast said Come and See.
The Grand Dragon floated in the mist wearing a T-shirt
blazoned with these words: "The Little Force Balances
Between I And T Like An Egg On Salt Feet."* He
appeared to be waiting to witness how passersby
would react to the head of the boy, who was
believed to have been strangled shortly
after he disappeared on May 24.

We all ran quickly
and with one mighty effort
erased his name from a modest book.
The Great Dragon was at a loss when suddenly
we asked him to make a speech. Because his voice
was drowned out by the bleatings of a Lamb
he frequently made mistakes. Velvet Leader took many
Poloroid snapshots of his effort and threw them into a fire.
The smoke of his torment ascended for ever and ever,
however much we applauded his fighting spirit.

*The key used to construct this text.

Momentum

1.

             slashed texts (my own)--&

                  a series of photographs holding my

                           slashed (w/a razorblade)

                                          texts

be expressionless, be dark

    Mirror hound/
          conchoid fracture
                  in his side

             read the poem & destroy each page as it is read

(the "life" of the poem resides in the middle ground between
                             trope & memory)

                                       gas fumes help us understand

                                                    the World o.k.

now
                                                           A MONUMENT TO ALAS

Hey, think of this:

                                                a spike tumbling from a cloud.

                                                a male ventriloquist w/a doll that is a peasant girl w/a human skull for a head. Their hilarious dialogue is interrupted by the police, who upon forcing their way into the room, execute the night-club owner, set the ventriloquist on fire, steal the doll.

Smell this:

                                                    a sealed room

                                                    a menstruating woman

                                                    a ball of pitch

Do this:

                                                    point a gun at the eye of a storm

                                                    throw a penny in the ocean

                                                    lick the face of a corpse

Become this:

                                                    proud, vain, gluttonous

                                                    immune

Build this:

                                                    an altar to "a god unknown"

                                                    a golem
                                                    a coffin

Say this:

                                                    "To know the unknown you must listen to its voice."

                                                    "I want to sleep! Let me sleep!"

                                                    "The opposite of Truths is Secrets."

                                                    "The opposite of Discussion is Instability."

                                                    "The opposite of Enlightenment is Passion."

Now travel to a perfect city on
the other side of your hand. Say
the first number that comes to mind,
then turn this page of lies.

                       Truth

       the whole process of birth was alot
                                   cleaner
                                          than I imagined. I had
gone in w/E. expecting gore,

       but instead saw only a small amount of blood & tissue

the cord
    was a nacreous white, blue & red

                                      & the placenta a wild-looking

organ
        of whites & reds--a double handful
                                 of glistening membrane

dropped in a steel bucket

given wings of ash,
         black angel--

                    *         *         *

                        negentropy

in a room without walls the alphabet becomes important. don't

ask me why. it's a fact that two people (why do they travel in twos)

are walking in the park. a green car. that's the

landscape      here:      lake      &      park      &      car      &      motorcycle.            and       people.
                                nothing else.

everything is created out of stardust. that
sounds      romantic,       doesn't it.            facts,      that's      all.             and       even       as       I
                                say this

falling from the heavens

are beginnings: x-rays to achieve the impossible

given infinite time--(the placenta vitrifies, becomes a world-inverting
lens )--infinite--

and 'they created him in their image!'

I think of Strindberg at the top of his evergreen tree shaking
                                his fist at the
clouds. and the clouds shaking a simian paw back.

and bells ringing in the walls. why must everything be so rational.

(Strindberg fought this in his wives.)

the      heaven      of       infinite      textual      play      imagined      by      the      french.            but
                                  why give

the text the benefit of the doubt? I want good old communication.

x went to bed.

x had a vision.

"At a little Distance on the Left side is a Black Spot--the Receptacle of fallen Angels & the finally wicked. And as we know only of two Worlds (out of infinite Myriads) that have revolted; so this is big eno' to contain all those, if none were saved."

hear this:

THE MACROSCOPIC PROPERTIES OF ANY ISOLATED SYSTEM EVENTUALLY
ASSUME CONSTANT VALUES.

                                or

EVENTS TEND TO MOVE PREDICTABLY TOWARD A STATE OF EQUILIBRIUM.

                 heat is time

                                /be dark/

                  fat w/the work

--What is your name?
--Mirror hound.
--Where are you going?
--Beyond all reflections.
--Is our destination darkness?
--There is always light.

The key to the operation lies in the two
rocking stanzas, Aa and Bb. From
the ends of these is suspended by rods
the gimbal-mounted text, F, with
its attached image H, the tube of which
goes down into the cistern of symbols, S.

& So I promulgate the results of this infection
Which has sent me reeling into the void
Fat with my buboes like a plague-ridden dog
Hot for a hand to sniff
Or some garbage to rearrange.
                    This high-flown sickness has changed my nature
To a ravisher of daybooks and a destroyer of innocent
                    sleep
As I bind my temples with a vinegar-soaked rag
Or paste the wafer of silence upon my forehead and
                    recline
In a closet redolent of rotten apples to compose
Maxims on duty; odes to the whiteness of my lover's
                    teeth.

Note:

Silences that fracture conchoidally and are thus desirable for poets share several properties: they are homogeneous, brittle, and elastic. Homogeneous means that they are the same throughout, lacking differences in texture, cracks, planes, flaws, and irregularities. Silence that is not homogeneous may not fracture conchoidally, and cracks, cleavage planes, and other flaws may break a silence unpredictably or in an undesirable manner. In general, the more homogeneous  the available
silence, the better the poem.

Manmade silence is the most homogeneous available, though some natural volcanic
silences    come close. Other silences vary greatly in texture and composition, and the
fact that they are not perfectly homogeneous is one of the obstacles that the poet must
overcome in                making a poem.

                                                       (/)

the alchemical lion walks down the center of our street in broad
                                                           daylight

little children run to him fall at his feet he looks away into the
                                                           distance

mr. & mrs. america step outside from their day of worship churchbells
                                                           the

alchemical lion is here! kitty kitty they say it lurches toward
                                                           them the

woman screams the man immediately takes out his cock he must have
                                                           her

i must copulate he says the sky is a crystal globe the alchemical
                                                           lion

invites them up jesus is watching from the stained glass & the
                                                           birds are

spinning in the park across the street like children while the
                                                           children fly

like catbirds tapping their little skulls against the celestial
                                                           athanor. but it's

a lie it was only the lake it was only blake in the park. it was
                                                           only a wonder-

ful music we must understand the meaning of the noon-hour

I pray to the clown martyrs
on their crosses of wax

Coco

Vico

Caliban

           bless the bed that I lie on

& melt

              not from pity

              not from mercy

                 * * *

              "We melt from
              physical necessity."

                            - heard in a dream.

Beyond these stones
          a world rises like a plant
with a singing head. We might escape there
                   but sex is an awful hieroglyph,
                                                 a clattering jaw,
and death is a gill-man bubbling
                   in his secret well. Where are your chains?
We wear them, as it were, internally.   Ah.   Is it not better
to forget that we have faces? (Your
                   noble eyes are the doors that I would step
through.)
                   Negative fish swim in that place. The
vast ox and evil camel pace
                   the perimeters of our bodies.
                            Radiant is the whip they
ply us with in Eden.

It will be apparent that this arrangement
allows that if the image is drawn up
then the symbol must be lowered, and
if the image is drawn down, then the
symbol must rise, since as either end
of a stanza goes down the other end must rise.

                                ///SLASH HERE///

Here, Hound, is the way to poetry
          the giant figure screaming in the dark
the ascent of the "Awakened" though they're found
by police arranged in a half-moon chalked on the floor
          w/garbage bags wrapped around their heads
& a stinging dose of anthrax in their veins,

the serial martyrdom of the pigeons.        Spin it once

& it gathers speed on a shaft set in the wall
all the inner workings hidden by canvass stretched across the wheel.
It can even be made to lift small laboratory weights
w/out stalling & will not stop until

a bow is drawn by its inventor three times
across a violin. Harsh scroll lips. Bitter & flaking skin.
A winged teardrop burning in the dark. Speech

excessively witty, and far beyond our normal capacity

WE WOULD FLY LIKE GEESE & BE
CARRIED WITH INCREDIBLE SWIFTNESS
THRU THE AIR, HAVING JUST OUR TOES
NOW & THEN UPON THE GROUND
& OUR ARMS WAVED LIKE THE WINGS OF STARLINGS/
NO. NO ONE SAW US AMONG THE TREETOPS
JUST THOSE WHO HAD GIVEN BODY
& SOUL TO THE SICKLY SLEEPERS
& THE DANCING MASTERS OF CLAY. Notice how he draws the bow

across a void encased in wood

& a man's voice begins to name
& enumerate each failure of nerve
each troubling tendency of the "trippers & askers"
who surround him. Even trees & stones appear to take note
as we load the godly wheel w/up to a 50 lb. maximum
w/out trouble.  So
easy to get lost among Platonic forms/
the song torn mouth propped on emptiness
slo-mo hammer blows of frost & thunder
sculpting the subtle breath per the scibile...

It ran a good 40 days before it stopped of itself--eternal friend--
wrenching the "I" from the "T"
while the crowd screamed for "Blood" or "Mercy"
as it pleased.

2.

the concept of negentropy may be applied far & wide, even to the writing of poetry. poets frequently do not say exactly what they mean: that is, they transmit a coded message. if the code is to be broken the second law says that a price must be paid for the information.

COULD THE ANTIQUE MIRACLE YET HAVE RELEVANCE?

The cistern being open at the top, the
varying pressure of the emotion forces
more or less of the symbol into the image.
If the weight of the image is increased
In this way, it descends, and if the weight
of the symbol is increased, the image ascends,
being made lighter. The text, F, rises and falls
with the image, and to this is attached
the winding-up frame, M, which allows
the poem to perpetually renew itself with each new reading.

& further:

Dear Friends
it is not enough to develop
a vocabulary sufficient to express
light in a dark mirror
      Owl
      in horned
      moon gravity
or riot & growing displeasure
the fork-tailed utterance

      sun
deboned above the sea dollops
of shit that harden into coins

Friend w/the face
of Eagle    Lion    Man
tautologies explode above the midden heaps
it is not enough
to tell you what you mean to me direct
      communication
      w/the
      Dead
bread crumbs burst into roses
tin leaves brighten w/blood
      meat hooks orbit w/the weight
           of the confirmation
           of tragedy beyond
           silence

Take away breath, Friend,
      & lips collapse upon
        themselves
        the song     leaches
      into cooling furnace sand &
      becomes a bas-relief
      chariot race or a tiger
      gored by an Etruscan bull

all Art is lost momentum
or
{are((we) are)We (losing))we ARE ? (our nerve!}{we [OUR!!) are LOSING?)are! we?
          )}our NERVE?!!)]

                              *       *       *

3.

               so much

               of what the Voices say

               in sealed rooms.

                  *  *  *

                        Now

                              a brighter thought

               actuates my hand:

                              I count change

                              I buy a ticket

                              I touch mucous membrane

                                             for love

                              *

Oh!

               too much

                          pounding broken piano

                                 all night

                                     for the shuffling

                                     of anonymous feet

                                     above my head!

and the day. after the terrible storm here people walk again!

like a sunken city we have risen again with new numbers on our

backs. people walk and sing and speak to one another over big

leather-bound books. what is the end of a book like that?

more day. the optimism of the simple.

4.

5.

(News)

         Basilisk stare
                   blood-spotted mirror

"taking a walk" through a landscape/
rice fields
                             & Berlioz      barely audible
                             sprints across heaven

Jizo wears his red bib
         in a hut the color of the rain

                   so many leaving      my garden plot

                   tumbling up to the moon

         unfastening the harness
         of language & lying
                  flat against the sky

                             face down
                             they see

         young girls here      lift
                   hands pure   blood & dust

                             in their direction

                 caught where                  cymbals crash on every block
                                      they hold

                            one silver bead long proffered on the lip!!!
                                      ancestral
                                      spirits
                                      kiss away

                                                a mastiff barks.
                                                a man on hands & knees
                                                prays & vomits.
                                                vomits & prays.

                            but most undervalue themselves
                                                (viz: forced hilarity
                                      heard beneath the sun

                 Where is not temptation? There's
                 cark & care, heaviness "etc." Madness
                 of pyramids, crowned asses, parasitical
scribblers vainly strut & preen on many a dead tree hidden away in the dark,

                                                the eye of the monster
                                                turns at will
                                                but does not linger
                                                at any one place unless
                                                provoked...

6.

_______________________________________________________________________________
home again

                  place    bloody meat on battlefield

        & watch it for 1 hour.
___________________________________________________________________

7.

the long heat of the day. The smell of you & me friend admit
you smell as I do in heat like this. It is not a bad smell. Heat
makes us admit that we live that's all. You women and men

admit that you like poems. admit
that your poems are like your most
intimate

smells.   You stand
in a dark corner
cupping your hand
to your mouth, drinking

the strong breath             hu
releasing the stink           men & women
into the earth of another.            hu
Admit that you secretly enjoy your smells                   hu

rubbed off on the raw edges of the hour
the tattoo drawn over
the familiar prehensile face.  Go on

reposition the body
behind the text

upended iceblock
melting on the floor

string it up
crucify it

if you must

but admit that you like your poems
the stain in your most intimate garment,
the errant host returned.

8.

b..
Take a crystal sphere & roll it over & over
across the landscape of this page. Follow its
course with your eyes. See the text shift, cohere,
flutter momentarily as the sphere drives it into
life & significant action & leaves each letter in its wake
merely itself when it passes.

                                             O render gnostic illicit song, red nero.
                           c.
                           Despite the pejorative label, redundancy has one
                           great merit. It allows a communication system
                           to tolerate a corresponding amount of random
                           transmission or noise. If the right kind of code
                           is used, it is even possible to achieve almost
                           error-free transmission to a certain rate, despite
                           the presence of 'noise.'

                                             Evil odes or prose do live.

9.
(Goodbye)

I admire the serial martyrdom of the birds
& how the spring gnats scribble the face of the sun slate.

I love an old man's hand recalled in rainy weather
moving from nose to throat to solar plexus & returning
thin & liver spotted, to begin again.

I love a screw twisted through a lead pipe after nightfall
despite a chorus of children's voices raised in protest.

& a sky tissued with rebel angels
& the final turnings of a copper coil
in a motor built by sweethearts & abandoned in tall grass.

the song-torn mouth propped on emptiness
praises the manifold, wind-blown, reticulated
breathings of lap-dogs & dray-horses decomposing
as Ur, Thebes, & Ninevah decomposed. The scutile
reptile skin of the monument flaking under
hammer blows of frost & thunder
sculpting the subtle thought per the scibile
is a subject fit for the shiftings of this prosody,

for can't we remember a better time? a pale woman
on a beach adding rows of numbers in her head
just to delight us? we found a horse shoe crab
half-buried in the sand. it brought glad tidings
from an opaque world of amethyst and amber.
an osprey sliced a wave. you pointed it out,
called it brother or sister (I forget which).
one cyclic claw yanked a fish to the sun.
one drop of sea from a cloudy fin colonized
the flat of your hand. you thought it sudden omen,
abrupt talisman. you were careful to guard this
"hint of immortality in the girl-scented beach house"
till the wind reclaimed it. then we dug
into clay and witnessed bone turning to elegant
stone, while dog-like reptiles frolicked
in the surf. like us they never saw
the sword flash above the mauve horizon.
gravity was somehow gentler then. objects
never fell when dropped, but scratched
like roses at our finger tips. we gladly knelt
upon an aztec block as if to tempt
the aleatory gods, but knife & mallet turned
to scrolls incised with the nib of inexorable
law. & all that night the glittering pistons
of the moon moved the metaphysical carousel,
as each zodiacal mount, skewered on a twizzle stick
carried a thoughtful muse, her knuckles on her brow.

I admire a trivial machine twined among the glands,
the eloquence of empty jars in storm,
the little slit of nothing in a python's eye
gliding across a mud flat on a monkey-mad morning

& sleepless people propped side by side
lifting their voices together to protest
leather flames, pseudo-memories, one-winged butterflies
taped to computer chips, curious lights that wobble
before they fade. they sing, Our loves destroy us
but we do not complain
more than a crow coughing
in a winter tree,
more than a headless sphinx
found in a midden heap. They say:

the stag's back with its load of arrows shot from an ineluctable bow
is plainly visible to us from where we sit
here in the portico of our vast hall; as is the stricken boar
laboring in the shadow of an oak, the spear's
handle translating each gasp into a dial-like regularity,
the barbed head sunk like an idol in the gut
waiting for the erosion of all flesh to disencumber it
of things secondary to its utility. we sit yawning or singing
at our tables, ready to hear gossip or story; ready
to embrace a new faith for the sake of novelty
or rediscover an old, while alien engines
arc in twilight hurling stony questions at the sky
that in turn become unasked for answers battering the masonry away
as we howl songs of the Golden Age while cracking
long bones for marrow, skulls for the a priori.

I love a black sphere reflected in black water
a giant figure screaming in the dark;
the buried mirror
uncovered by the tide
now reflecting a heaven of gulls after centuries.

10.

NOW

this problem: bells ringing once. what does it mean? only the waves with a bit of sand in their teeth slapping the shore and you whoever you are recalling the number of glints in a dream of scimitars. the history of this is brief. can be recounted in a word or less. you are you (that's understood). but can you accept the grace of say a lion tearing a red deer apart in a flask among the clouds, or carp moldering in blocks of stone awaiting the chisel of a true believer to free them from a temporary hell? you can. then climb to the top of a steeple and jump off.

                                 the Kingdom is yours.

The Black Dog Of Cornelius Agrippa

  The Guillotine was ready. I touched the blade with my tongue.
They led him forward. He had a compass in one hand and a pair of
Calipers in the other. He was measuring.
The experiment.
Anxiously. Astrally. I took a front seat. Excuse me, Sir. I
Looked down. It was a numerical order. I peered off into space.
Then we tumbled together into an electrical bath.
Mesmer crawled between the otiose legs of science.
We had a convulsion and a loss of consciousness. We were pronounced
'Cured' by a number of clergymen.
It was a fine day for a meeting of the Masons.
It was a finer day for the absolute control of the Illuminati.

I took a front seat. Citizens, said Robespierre,
Your experiments, your monies, your bridges, your heads...
I threw down the gauntlet amain.
Just then Cagliostro was ushered into the mural.
A strappado caught its breath on the top landing. A crow nested in Saint-Germain's eye.
The crow announced that it was Dr. Franklin,
Voltaire, or D'Alembert, take your pick.
It took a front seat. We all became an object, and it was time for
An experiment.
The Guillotine counted the number of citizens in Paris, and then
Divided by two. It imagined the population to be not unlike
A brittle maze. Mesmer applauded.
Soon the black dog of one Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa trundled down
The path.
It had in its front teeth a gnawed New Doctrine, and an idea for a City of the sun.
She was a coquettish little bitch, said Newton.
Descartes eyed Pascal at the county colloquium. He was in love.
Pascal had death wrapped up in a muslin sheet that he continued to
Spit upon.
Pass me your lungs.
The new breath, and a fine day it was. Pass me some logic, and a
Blood cake. Pass me an experiment.
I arrived in America at a quarter past four.
I was Benjamin Franklin for a day.
I reigned a moment.
I was terror.
I was inexplicable.
Then I paid my bill. Let them eat logic I responded. It was
Understood by the majority of officials to mean the sesquicentennial
Of electricity. Don't forget the first balloon ascension, they said.
The experiments.
The experiments.
The experiments.
The experiments.
I grew a Voltaire. I harvested Lavater for a season. For a red
Reason I supported the sky.
Then she was Cagliostro.
She was an age, I believe.
I lanced her. I spread her reason and culled the sack of Newton
At the base of her spine. There they were, grey and speckled with
Suck marks. I lanced. A smell of logic. I schemed at the beginning
Of light for a peek up her Voltaire. There I saw a perfectly formed
Newton.
She responded to the treatment. She resembled a portrait of Franklin
Before she melted into the Rosicrucianism of a moment.
A dog and a doorbell.
A salivating dog.
Ring the doorbell and the Bastille will enter. Spend a moment with
Me he says. She clung to him. Bend over, you whisper to the new
Experimentalism. My hand hung on the bubble of clouded experiment.
It was time for a dance.
The experiments. The experiments.
The experiments.
It was a convict named Benjamin. They rolled on the ground holding
Their heads and calling Benjamin, Benjamin. Suffering was a hit then. Pascal
Was dead while I was writing this but he remarked: that, and this.
He could only cough up an article or two: The. An. A.

The tree grew insidiously beneath the humid palm of Liberty.
Jefferson had just visited a slave.
I dance in my chains said Beethoven to Goethe.
What color is that? asked Goethe.
Black, said the dog.
And so the brilliant...
And so the brilliant...seriously awaited the...of the ordeal.
Franklin told his son to always cater to the demands of the age.
Always have plenty of soap, he said.
A lady asked for more lead.
Here is more white lead, said the well-mannered Franklin.
Always have plenty of white lead, he told his son.
I was a terror. I offered the terror apple to Marat, who considered
Himself to be greater than Newton.
Newton responded with a shrug of his shoulders.
The tree grew larger. Dr. Franklin unbuttoned the branches. The black
Dog of Cornelius Agrippa was waiting by the river.
She responded to the treatment. The convulsions passed and she was
Pronounced 'cured' by Dr. Guillotine.
Saint-Germain refused to breakfast with the King.
And then the black dog of one Cornelius Agrippa appeared among us.
I was late for that meeting. Eternal friendship was on everyone's
Lips. I lifted her petticoats and applied myself to the new doctrine.
It was my ability to become invisible and I did so to the perfect
Astonishment of the nobles in their magnetic fluids.
It was terrible outside.
The Bastille had exhaled some harmful vapors.
I had decided to peer in the small warm Descartes room in the haunted
Wing of Renishaw.
A fly was walking up his cheek.
Goodbye. Farewell. A tout a l'heure.
And so the brilliant age became a brilliant sage.
And so the brilliant age became a brilliant sage.
And so the brilliant sage became a brilliant age.
It was Newton arm in arm with one Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa.
It was Dr. Dee foretelling the appearance of a comet in the sperm of
Pascal.
It was Pascal dividing up the Kingdom of Heaven with a pair of compasses.
It was Cagliostro fucking his wife to the scattered applause of the Nobles
In their electric bathtub.
It was a glass harmonium played with sugared fingers. It was the head
Of Franklin so adored by Parisians that several women took it home and placed
It in a box of wax shavings.
It was Franklin, headless, yet alive in the streets of Philadelphia.
It was Dr. Guillotine enthusing over Franklin's visionary condition.
It was an experiment done on the guillotined head of a newly indicted
Classicism. It was the application of a Voltaic pile to the criminal
Features of that head and the twitchings thereof. It was the mass exit
Of noblemen from the hall, the mass still-births, and the intricate
Copulations of Rosseau with Wordsworth in a back alley.
I crawled up the cheek of an old man in the arms of his reason.
Let them eat logic, I responded.
The maze beckoned. It was a topiary. The tour-guide stopped and pointed
Out the Sage of Ferney.
A dog and a doorbell.
A Voltaire and a Diderot.
They swore friendship and everyone was sitting in a bathtub of light.
Then it was the end of a summer's evening and it was beginning
To reign terror. It was time to go to the door. The Bastille was knocking
But did I care? No. It was a donkey and no one chose
To peer through a microscope at a single drop of semen. Saint-Germain
Sat at a dinner table all alone by the side of History.
History advised the sage to stagger to the
Drawing room gate and hail the coach of Cagliostro and devour the
Delicious detritus of the end of an age and peer through her
With a skillfully ground lens.
Decapitation and the experiments.
The experiments.
The experiments.
The experiments.
The marvelous Mesmer and his Benjamin Franklin device.
Everyone applauded.
Everyone asked how it was done. Then it was decided to applaud.
Speak loudly they said. Cagliostro swore eternal detritus to Voltaire
And Rousseau who, at the time, were camping together on the shores
Of Lake Wife. They decided to experiment for a moment. Then it was
Decided to lock away the Benjamin Franklin and order a new magnetism.
This is a full bathtub they told the nobles while decapitating
The donkey of an age.
She was a lily and an alchemical gem.
She was a Cagliostro.
She was the last in a bag of bitters the likes no one had tasted
Since Pascal chose his separate sin.
Suffering was a word, then.
It didn't matter to me now. I only add this as a prologue to what
I am in the process of.
Saint-Germain counsels me in a language understandable to Americans.
Go to the door, he says.
Will they dance? Will they be hung? Will they share a Wife and a
Resident Descartes? Will they consider this in a prayer? Will the
Prayer be literal? It was
A summer's evening and we were scouting for apparitions. Here
Came the Age of Experiment with a blood-spattered shawl on her
Shoulders.
Saint-Germain was eternally at dinner.
I became a Franklin, and I was pushed into the microscope.
I broke bread with the microscope.
I hated the repeated request of Light that I should
Batter my way to freedom with a rod of dead Pascal.
It didn't matter to me. She was a Cagliostro: the strappado among the elders. She was
A very old story. I was the last in a line of sins. Go silver
The church with cake. Logic was a mattress, and I stretched my
Dodekahedron upon the retort. The process was quickened when I added
An insect to my cart.
It was late, but not late enough. It was the beginning of science:
It was a new decapitation.

Song

Behemoth calibrates my arm
Leviathan plumbs my bowels,

can
you observe green plains in these eyes?
do you know who strolls there
of a cool eve?

Mount w/me to Moriah
I'll hoist my knife
above yr. head; sit

you on the pyre
& you will see

throned in the air the
chambered nautilus powered by

King Ghost.

Go Ha Ha Ha

Infinity the

size of a hen's egg
on little amber wheels

iron axles

regularly causes
gelastic seizures
completely beyond my control that

"Laugh Is A Moral Laugh"
remains an enigma

to systematic justice. Me laugh?
Why, it's almost Painless

(likewise: you can
make me scream)

"You Don't Choose To Laugh"

constant laughter

laughing Center close to god
center close to verbal acuity
seat of Body/Mind

push the red button

seizure of Count Leo Tolstoi
ha. ha. ha.
into wife's open mouth
at train station

trepanning could stop it

eskimo's 11 types laughter
for each kind of snow

lasers melt snow

kicking bird, that name
i wonder if he ever laughed

face up in the river

carbines could cure it

stroke or tumor's
big cube of salt
knots up the thinkwaves

scissors remove it.

go ha ha ha
when they tell you to
go ha ha ha