Once upon a time, I read that the perfect age for writing quality poetry is twenty-three. Apparently most of T.S. Elliot’s stuff came out then, the rest having to do with non-poetic words. I realized January 19ththat I will turn twenty-four in three months, and since I started writing some poems before it’s too late: forty-six poems at twenty-three. I’ll post each Friday until the last week of March, then I’ll post one a day until my birthday on April 30th. Here’s number 37 (block out some time for this one, it’s epic):
I.
Before the sounds of summer came
Among cold Rocky Mounts,
The City of the Silent grove
Was spun (by one account).
Before the cries of citadels
Besieged by bitter bands
The City of the Silent grove
Signed sonnets in the land
Decades on Amerigo’s coast,
Scores of centuries spent,
White horses crashed upon his shores,
On the Still City went.
Still City knew the Union
When brothers drove apart
She heard the shot heard round the world
Saw Chinook Ship Monsters haunt New World
And hushed her bleeding heart.
For the end of their world came long ago
When pirates stole their bay.
Like children of an afterbirth,
Now we who walk on sand, on earth
Came long after judgement day.
Yes the end of the world was long ago,
But not what the Chinook saw
For the whore on the seven hills will rot
By her own damned martial law
When Rome unwrapped her pax Romana
On her margined fiefs
She set herself up for rape and pillage
By foreign peasant thieves
Oh it came on silent night
It came on midnight clear
That in the borderlands of Rome
Where asps, camels, locusts make their home
Our coup d’etat appear
But when every road bends around to Rome
When ev’ry state declines
Poor people rise to take the throne
White horses clash thawed cannon bones
And the city-state resigns
For wind blew down from northern lands
To freeze their molten blood
Unleashed from her ancient bulwark cage
By nameless terrors beyond age
She brought a frosted flood
Where warriors stood upon the gates
To shield the city’s lost
Their migrants painted on their brink
Archangels passed onto others, drank
Their sacrament of frost
For wind blew o’er from eastern lands
To topple anchored spires
Roused up from his ancient slumber cave
To wake the dead, upend the grave
To the tune of grisly choirs
Where mourners kneeled afoot the hill
To rue her dead, to wail
Noreaster twisted every sound
To bleat like the weep of a basset hound
By cyclone, squall and gale
For wind blew up from the southern lands
To burn away the chaff
Stirred from his gilded feasting-hall
Annoyed and armed with his mace and maul
He sounds the curtain call
Where mockers mocked their wounded peers
Inside the palace pyre
South wind removed the flaming sword
Hidden in Eden once sheathed, restored
Let loose Beginning’s Fire
When ashes settled, snow on sea
When twisters slowed to sighs
When hoarfrost melted, flooded rivers
New earth dried, now baptized
When those left hidden in the caves
Some camped on mountain peaks
Remembered what incited all
Rome’s storms and rising creeks
They wrote it down upon the scrolls
Passed down to us today
A Jewish child past Roman border
Born upon the hay
But that, I said, passed long ago
‘Fore pirates stole the bay.
Like children of an afterbirth,
Now we who walk on sand, on earth
Came long after judgement day.
And every native of the land
And every painted face
Renewed a vision as tide rose
At the spearhead of their Anglo foes
Which silenced every space
Between the death of Chinook babes
And wind-blasts of the whore
A silence settled on the isle
Up from the sand in a twisted smile
To still the City’s shore.
Still silent evermore…
II.
Once was wood fort of the frontier’s men
A bulwark formed of tall
Timbers felled from cold virgin woods
By lumberjacks sprung from Titan axe-men
Stood strong, the wooden wall
Late by the gate under gleaming moon
One wise man brought our boon
He whispered of our unsung fear
His twisted words hit twisted ears
Of the counsel of our doom
Yet we don’t speak of silent things
Spoke under night’s gray light
We’d rather nod or point or stare
Or kick folks out forthright
That wall grew up from wood to stone
From stone to marble halls
From marble grew an obelisk
To mark our starting stalls
One chipmunk ran around its base
Five cattle came behind
One general’s legion followed them
Then cars and trains combined
Our street ran by the sharp stone
But it had a nameless face
Until one gambling troubadour
Who grew up run aground, in shore
Wrote “Wall” upon the place
They made a sign from the polished timbers
That once preserved the fort
He wrote four letters in the wood
First one for winter, “L”s for good
The vowel for anyone
Our people flocked to city gate
Before the obelisk
To bid and bet and stake and risk
For family, love, or fate
The Wall-street ran across the river
Over the western shore
It turned into an interstate
And gained its own rapport
The crowds, they came from Baton Rouge
From Vegas, Saint Louise
With tickets, tickers, ticked tick-tocks
For money labeled “free”
Deep beneath the obelisk
Which marked the massive grave
Where bones of Titans carved with wood
Marked for the others bans and shoulds
Howling to all “BEHAVE!”
A noiseless stir awakened the woodsmen
Under our credit crypt
Boring holes their hoard arose
When breached streets surface, thorn of rose
Tranquility unzipped
Now in the room upon the floor
Within Wall’s sepulcher
No man nor woman nor their child
Stood in trading room tamed wild
From silence, we infer
Where once the sounds of wealth pealed out
Into all city streets
Now quiet rests the heaving chests
Of lovers who know the stillness besting
Gambler’s loud receipts.
III.
Before our Dark Knight haunted Gotham’s
Trasylvanian wings
Before horse racers chase big apples
While warm sirens sing
Before the Fort of Worth could gamble
All night, dirty, cheap
We knew our city’s moniker
As one that never sleeps
But I have slept above the town
Where horns and pigeons flee
Where screaming victims cries grow still
Under the churn of a tower mill
Beneath a storm cloud’s knee
At morning, at three, when no souls come out
I woke to look below
The cars lay dead, the kids in bed
E’en sewer rats left much unsaid
Streets smooth like fresh-turned snow
I jumped out from the window pane
I fell ten floors in secs
Past dozing grandmas, snoozing dogs
Beyond the peace of subliming togs
And fiancees dreaming of sex
As I fell, then I looked down the avenue
To north, to south again
No lights poked out of the black alcoves
For the city gagged itself in droves
Unlike frayed Baharain
I called out to the quietude
Which bore me to the park
I stood among the sleeping squirrels
Nestled in the dark
Then flying up among the treetops
I chanced on a grove
Which others named, “the place of titles”
I just called it “love.”
One lone Hawthorne inside our rocky park
Drank up rare central soil
Its rich live shined out in its bark
Shaded calm like the tight-lipped lark
Beyond all other foil
Tapped thrice did I upon the trunk
Wait then three seconds more
This tree had known to give the names
Of the world, the elements, the games
Played by all run ashore
But Hawthorne kept a silent stare
Shut up his whispered mouth
When asked I for the name of Gotham
She pointed west by south
So flew I down to the Island’s point
To listen up some more
Yet hearing now the city’s voice
Known by all run ashore
She is not like the Vegas whisper
Not like NOLA bands
She speaks not like a Texan’s swagger
Not like Cali hands
Before the sounds of winter came
Among warm Appalachia
The City of the Silent grove
Stay quiet, … … … …
Before the cries of citadels
Besieged by bitter bands
The City of the Silent grove
Signed sonnets in the land
Decades on Amerigo’s coast,
Scores of centuries spent,
White horses crashed upon his shores,
On the Still City went.
IV.
(an interlude)
Oh hear the sound of the wakened beast!
Oh see her rise from the coast!
She knows I’ve called her to her feet!
She knows her silent toast.
Oh hear her wait for the coming calls
The woes have not yet passed
Let her fall, let her flail to the wailing wall
For the silence, still, will last
V.
The King of England landed
With troops armed at his side
His standard scarlet-branded
By the anvil, polished, sanded
Leave the wounded flailing, stranded
On the heels of his wake, his pride
The Lords of Norseland mooring
North of the island point
Ten thou ships collided, shoring
With the breakers ripple-roaring
One by one I called them, “boring!”
Charged he south to make a point.
The Aztecs marched from southlands
Glazed skin, soaked from their sun
Gold-plated armor withstand
Poisoned darts, feigned shows, slight of hand,
The brazen battalion’s command
And the ever-gattling gun
Unspeakable foes came
From west, fog, mist, murk, drizzle
Hammer down upon our flame
Malign the others, kings defame,
Beauty of subtle war-game
Seared flesh stank from the grizzle
Met all four foes and my life there
Upon the silent isle
Quadrumvirate hemmed me in
Yet on my lips, a smile?
The King of England gasped a breath
The Lords of Norseland panted
The Aztec tow-dyed huffed-blew
The Black Cloud disenchanted
Prepared all armies for their speech
Drew up they words for telling
Composed they rhetoric for slander,
(They thought themselves compelling).
Yet stood I there beside the tree
O. Henry in the forest
We muted out our words from them
And with our muzzle, held within
Their words they hoped would stir us.
And when they spoke, I sucked it out
The whole lot of their voices
I inhaled every vocal chord
That curses or rejoices
And when they saw the silence here
A grove primeval, virgin
The Quartet throng let tacit deference
Sing all best left unsaid.
A full half-hour heaven hushed
To hear the island’s prayer
Their hearing washed us, living flush
World’s foursome turning tail to rush
Mail, horses, sabers, buckles brushing
Past taciturning air
And I and I flew back to home
And I then dreamed of war
And I heard crashes on the coast
White horses on the shore.
VI.
Awakened I inside my bed
Stirred not, to bind the heat
It shifted under piles of sheets
Hoping to find a way to flee
Warming my chest, my seat
Succumbed I too the restless wind
Aside my covered core
Breaking out humidity
My mind ached, tired, sore
Leaving out front into still city’s streets
Pajama pant-legs long
Vast puddles licked at my cuffs
Climbed the cold to scarf, to muffs
Heard I then the song
Multitudes passed my striding
Walking past in droves
I went downtown among the lights
To see fare, shows, bar-brawling fights
Ten million treasure troves
If you were there along with me
And waited several years
You’d only just begin to mind
That sound that hit my ears
Ten million people in five miles
Ten million five beyond
But one sound shifted in the sea
Of people moving busily
On this side of the pond
A decade past, it holds the fort
A century, the wall
Deep in the soil ten thousand years
You hear the roar? The call?
The song sang long before the White Horse
First hit Britan’s rocks
Our anthem of our generation
Preservatives and liberation
Pandora’s music box
Stand with me in the corner now!
Stand Times Square, Wall, our park
Hear rat, ant, true man, rosy sow,
Heifer, eagle, lion’s growl
Both mockingbird and lark
Sing onward, isle! Intone your noise!
Belt out your eld refrain!
Listen, my friends, unto her now.
I’m telling you her name:
VII.
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This is excellent.
I only have two questions.
Why Chinook and why Hawthorne?
I know a lot about the Chinook and about N. Hawthorne and was a bit curious.
And Hawthorne because I got his twice-told tales at the same time as O. Henry’s short story, “The Voice of the City” Initially, I mixed them up. But in retrospect, I like the idea of the tree and I read far more of Hawthorne in that time than O. Henry, and learned a great deal more about the city from Hawthorne too, namely with “The Great Carbuncle”
Chinook because of their ancient myth of the ship-monster (taken from here:
“The son of an old woman had died. She wailed for him a whole year and then she stopped. Now one day she went to Seaside. There she used to stop, and she returned. She returned walking along the beach. She nearly reached Clatsop; now she saw something. She thought it was a whale. When she came near it site saw two spruce trees standing upright on it. She thought, “Behold! it is no whale. It is a monster.” She reached the thing that lay there. Now she saw that its outer side was all covered with copper. Ropes were tied to those spruce trees and it was full of iron. Then a bear came out of it. He stood on the thing that lay there. He looked just like a bear, but his face was that of a human being. Then she went home. Now she thought of her son, and cried, saying, “Oh, my son is dead and the thing about which we heard in tales is on shore.” When she nearly reached the town she continued to cry. [The people said,] “Oh, a person comes crying. Perhaps somebody struck her.” The people made themselves ready. They took their arrows. An old man said, “Listen!” Then the people listened. Now she said all the time, “Oh, my son is dead, and the thing about which we heard in tales is on shore.” The people said,
p. 278
[paragraph continues] “What may it be?” They went running to meet her. They said, “What is it?” “Ah, something lies there and it is thus. There are two bears on it, or maybe they are people.” Then the people ran. They reached the thing that lay there. Now the people, or what else they might be, held two copper kettles in their hands. Now the first one reached there. Another one arrived. Now the person’s took their hands to their mouths and gave the people their kettles. They had lids. The men pointed inland and asked for water. Then two people ran inland. They hid themselves behind a log. They returned again and ran to the beach. One man climbed up and entered the thing. He went down into the ship. He looked about in the interior of the ship; it was full of boxes. He found brass buttons in strings half a fathom long. He went out again to call his relatives, but they had already set fire to the ship. He jumped down. Those two persons had also gone down. It burnt just like fat. Then the Clatsop gathered the iron, the copper, and the brass. Then all the people learned about it. The two persons were taken to the chief of the Clatsop. Then the chief of the one town said, “I want to keep one of the men with me.” The people almost began to fight. Now one of them was taken to one town. Then the chief was satisfied. Now the Quenaiult, the Chehalis, the Cascades, the Cowlitz, and the Klickatat learned about it and they all went to Clatsop. The Quenaiult, the Chehalis, and the Willapa went. The people of all the towns went there. The Cascades, the Cowlitz, and the Klickatat came down the river. All those of the upper part of the river came down to Clatsop. Strips of copper two fingers wide and going around the arm were exchanged for one slave each. A piece of iron as long as one-half the forearm was exchanged for one slave. A piece of brass two fingers wide was exchanged for one slave. A nail was sold for a good curried deerskin. Several nails were given for long dentalia. The people bought this and the Clatsop became rich. Then iron and brass were seen for the first time. Now they kept these two persons. One was kept by each chief; one was at the Clatsop town at the cape.”
[...] another post @ Stake, and was encouraged by a Jewish literary fan from Seattle to submit this poem to the New Yorker this week. What do you think about [...]
Thanks for the response. I feel like punching my fist in the air because I got it right, but was curious about the use of a Pacific NW Native word/tribe that has many meanings. I figured you were well-versed. Ouch, no pun intended, but I’ll leave it anyway ’cause I laughed at myself.
We still use some Chinook words out here ya know.
Same with Hawthorne, yea! It’s a tree, it’s a famous writer, it’s a story, it is personal experience… great symbol.
welcome, haha. you totally should just like Drew on Elizabethtown. Yeah, it’s a juxtaposition, but I think a valuable one. (nice pun)
What words?
Thanks. I love it when a metaphor comes together…
Here is a link to the most popular word- “skookum”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skookum
THAT’S SO COOL! I love that word!
You seriously use that a lot up there?
[...] another post @ Stake, and was encouraged by a Jewish literary fan from Seattle to submit this poem to the New Yorker this week. What do you think about [...]