43. Ready When the Wave Is

Why am I eating a biscuit as I write this?

Is that unpretentious enough for us all?

How far back does the memory of this poem go?

Can there be anything in it that will really heal?

Why do some poets write crisp, neat & decorous?

Is there any truth, then, in that legend?

How can these tangled lines help us to arrive?

Can it be that easy to write down how to cook?

Why are some words familiar and others shaken lines?

Is this forming anything we can call a poem?

How will it all be ready when the wave is?

Can anyone care two figs for all these words?

Why do we link the arrowed lines & the scrawled together?

Is there any escape from this gemination of left & right?

How is any process that is worthwhile helped forward here?

Can one poem be further than any other, or ?

33. Towards the End of October, Then

OK then – what shall we give the children who come calling?

Should anyone, then, receive their just deserts?

Then is it just your family or your fantasy you write about?

Where in this are we all together then?

Can we really say it is okay to build upon this shattered ground?

How can we raise up a feast yet call this cooking simple?

Can any of this actually be done without lies?

When will the children arrive?

Is this voyage in daylight? – surely in ever deepening drabness?

Where in this can you find any human joy that may be true?

Why do you shift your attention to the grass, of all things?

Is it in fact familiar?

                        & then who to?

When the children have gone, how do you measure this silence?

When you hear in this some kind of call – what?

When will you go down to join our common occupation?

When, okay, will the common wound then

                                       begin too to heal?

24. Reaching the Iussive at Last

Why aren’t there always more people, then?

Isn’t it very confused, too, around about the middle of things?

Have we forgotten that rage, hate & greed?

But don’t we think, though, on these continually & without purpose?

What is the secret process of that word used for “only”?

Is it significant the language you hear is Polish?

Does dentition imply or deny its gummy substrate?

Is the end point really our present state of lock-down?

Why can’t it be love or French or spaced out, whatever …^[1]?

Will you really buy me a cup of coffee, here, now?

What are the waves of playful language?

Is working dirty?^[2] And Nik & Jeanette here^[3]?

How can you ask questions with such words?

How can you ask questions in such a world?

How can everything be stuck in this slow, grinding whirl?

How can you start a statement beginning “I’ll”^[4]?

---

[1] pleasure?

[2] stains?

[3] hope?

[4] just say it

17. For the Time Being

Why do we experience such destruction as moments of deep freedom?

For what reasons are these poor thieves treated ten times worse than thieves in good suits?

Who is it, though, who takes charge when there is no law?

Why do we always destroy what we need to make life bearable?

Why do we shut down the world around this wound in our language?

What will we end up by having to accept as our real now?

Where will Karla & Darrel drift across to now?

Why does it all end up in wet rubble, cardboard, shattered glass?

Why has everything been taken from us at this time again?

What feeling is it we have at this loss of what defined us?

How dangerous will be our new constraints? . . .  or rather full of ridicule?

Why is the weeping red wound of our life still all around us?

Why have Karla & Darrel halted at the edge of this street now?

Who are you talking to, and why, and with what language?

How can you know anything about us or dare to give us voice?

Why do you respond to what has happened just with words?

5. And Then?

This is what you do – isn’t it?

Don’t you pick it up & carry on?

Where else would you take it to but here?

And what do you expect from this then?

Why isn’t this shut down as pleasure?

Isn’t this wavelike repetition much too formal?

And why the fuck the fighting stallions then?

Aren’t you here dark & lost again?

Why doesn’t the outsideness press in more?

How come this heap of stones is the world?

And is just whatever comes good enough then?

Is that the wound you’re talking about?

Are all these ridiculous people really lovable?

Didn’t they turn some world into this heap of stones?

Why the fuck do you carry on accepting this?

And isn’t that wound what you are then?