Because we met at dusk Under the shadow of the railroad station clock While my shade was visiting Lima And your ghost was dying in Lima old face needing a shave And my young beard sprouted magnificent as the dead hair in the sands of Chancay Because I mistakenly thought you were melancholy Saluting your 60 year old feet which smell of the death of spiders on the pavement And you saluted my eyes with your anisetto voice Mistakenly thinking I was genial for a youth (my rock and roll is the motion of an angel flying in a modern city) (your obscure shuffle is the motion of a seraphim that has lost its wings) I kiss you on your fat cheek (once more tomorrow Under the stupendous Disaguaderos clock) Before I go to my death in an airplane crash in North America (long ago) And you go to your heart-attack on an indifferent street in South America (Both surrounded by screaming communists with flowers in their a.s.s) -- you much sooner than I -- or a long night alone in a room in the old hotel of the world watching a black door . . . surrounded by sc.r.a.ps of paper
DIE GREATLY IN THY SOLITUDE
Old Man, I prophesy Reward Vaster than the sands of Pachacamac Brighter than a mask of hammered gold Sweeter than the joy of armies naked f.u.c.king on the battlefield Swifter than a time pa.s.sed between old Nasca night and new Lima in the dusk Stranger than our meeting by the Presidential Palace in an old cafe ghosts of an old illusion, ghosts of indifferent love -- THE DAZZLING INTELLIGENCE Migrates from Death To make a sign of Life again to you Fierce and beautiful as a car crash in the Plaza de Armas I swear that I have seen that Light I will not fail to kiss your hideous cheek when your coffin"s closed And the human mourners go back to their old tired Dream.
And you wake in the Eye of the Dictator of the Universe.
Another stupid miracle! I"m mistaken again!
Your indifference! my enthusiasm! I insist! You cough!
Lost in the wave of Gold that flows thru the Cosmos.
Agh I"m tire of insisting! Goodby, I"m going to Pucallpa to have Visions.
Your clean sonnets?
I want to read your dirtiest secret scribblings, your Hope, in His most Obscene Magnificence. My G.o.d!
May 19, 1960
Note: Chancay, Pachacamic, Nasca -- Pre-incaic cultures of coastal desert Peru. Myriad relics found by graverobbers opening the sand of these necropolises. Chancay, Pachacamic, Nasca -- Pre-incaic cultures of coastal desert Peru. Myriad relics found by graverobbers opening the sand of these necropolises.
AETHER
11:15 PM May 27
4 Sniffs & I"m High, Underwear in bed, white cotton in left hand, archtype degenerate, b.l.o.o.d.y taste in my mouth of Dentist Chair music, Loud Farts of Eternity -- an owl with eyegla.s.ses scribbling in the cold darkness -- All the time the sound in my eardrums of trolleycars below taxi fender cough -- creak of streets -- Laughter & pistol shots echoing at all walls -- tic leaks of neon -- the voice of Myriad rushers of the Brainpan all the chirps the crickets have created ringing against my eares in the instant before unconsciousness before, -- the teardrop in the eye to come, -- the Fear of the Unknown -- One does not yet know whether Christ was G.o.d or the Devil -Buddha is more rea.s.suring.
Yet the experiments must continue!
Every possible combination of Being -- all the old ones! all the old Hindu Sabahadabadie-pluralic universes ringing in Grandiloquent Bearded Juxtaposition, with all their minarets and moonlit towers enlaced with iron or porcelain embroidery, all have existed -- and the Sages with white hair who sat crosslegged on a female couch -- hearkening to whatever music came from out the Wood or Street, whatever bird that whistled in the Marketplace, whatever note the clock struck to say Time -- whatever drug, or aire, they breathed to make them think so deep or simply hear what pa.s.sed, like a car pa.s.sing in the 1960 street beside the Governmental Palace in Peru, this Lima year I write.
Kerouac! I salute yr wordy beard. Sad Prophet!
Salutations and low bows from baggy pants and turbaned mind and horned foot arched eyebrows & Jewish Smile -- One single specimen of Eternity -- each of us poets.
Breake the Rhythm! (too much pentameter) . . . My G.o.d what solitude are you in Kerouac now?
-- heard the whoosh of carwheels in the 1950 rain -- And every bell went off on time, And everything that was created Rang especially in view of the Creation For This is the end of the creation This is the redemption Spoken of This is the view of the Created by all the Drs, nurses, etc of creation; i.e.,
-- The unspeakable pa.s.sed over my head for the second time.
and still can"t say it!
i.e. we are the sweepings of the moon we"re what"s left over left over from perfection -- from perfection -- The universe is an OLD mistake I"ve understood a million times before and always come back to the same scissor brainwave-- The Sooner or later all Consciousness will be eliminated because Consciousness is a by-product of -- (Cotton & N2O) Drawing saliva back from the tongue -- Christ! you struggle to understand One consciousness & be confronted with Myriads -- after a billion years with the same ringing in the ears and pterodactyl-smile of Oops Creation, known it all before.
A Buddha as of old, with sirens of whatever machinery making cranging noises in the street and pavement light reflected in the facade RR Station window in a d.i.n.ky port in Backwash of the murky old forgotten fabulous whatever Civilization of Eternity, -- with the RR Sta Clock ring midnight, as of now, & waiting for the 6th you write your Word, and end on the last chime -- and remember This one one twelve was struck twelve was struck before, and never again never again; both.
..........I stood on the balcony waiting for an explosion of Total Consciousness of the All -- being Ginsberg sniffing ether in Lima.
The same struggle of Mind, to reach the Thing that ends its process with an X comprehending its befores and afters, unexplainable to each, except in a prophetic secret recollective hidden half-hand unrecorded.
way.
As the old sages of Asia, or the white beards of Persia scribbled on the margins of their scrolls in delicate ink remembering with tears the ancient clockbells of their cities and the cities that had been -- Nasca, Paracas, Chancay & Secrecy of the Priests buried, Cat G.o.ds of all colors, a funeral shroud for a museum -- None remember but all return to the same thought before they die --what sad old knowledge, we repeat again.
Only to be lost in the sands of Paracas, or wrapped in a mystic shroud of Poesy and found by some kid in a thousand years inspire what dreadful thoughts of his own?
It"s a horrible, lonely experience. And Gregory"s letter, and Peter"s . . .
May 28 7:30 PM ...In the foul dregs of Circ.u.mstance "Male and Female He created them" with mustaches.
There ARE certain REPEATED (pistol shot) reliable points of reference which the insane (pistol shot repeated outside the window) -- madman suddenly writes -- THE PISTOL SHOT outside -- the REPEATED situations the experience of return to the same place in Universal Creation Time -- and every time we return we recognise again that we HAVE been here & that is the Key to Creation -- the same pistol shot -- DOWN, bending over his book of Un intelligable marvels with his mustache.
(my) Madness is intelligable reactions to Unintelligable phenomena.
Boy -- what a marvellous bottle, a clear gla.s.s sphere of transparent liquid ether -- (Chloraethyl Merz) 9 PM I know I am a poet -- in this universe -- but what good does that do -- when in another, without these mechanical aids, I might be doomed to be a poor Disneyan Shoe Store Clerk -- This consciousness an accident accident of one of the Ether- of one of the Ether- possible worlds, not the Final World Wherein we all look Crosseyed & triumph in our Virginity without wearing Rabbit"s-foot ears or eyes looking sideways strangely but in Gold Humbled & more knowledgeable, acknowledge the Vast mystery of our creation -- without giving any sign that we have heard from the GREAT CREATOR WHOSE NAME I NOW p.r.o.nOUNCE: GREAT CREATOR OF THE UNIVERS, IF THY WISDOM ACCORD IT AND IF THIS NOT BE TOO MUCH TO ASK MAY I PUBLISH YOUR NAME?
I ASK IN THE LIMA NIGHT FEARFULLY WAITING ANSWER,
hearing the buses out on the street hissing, Knowing the Terror of the World Afar -- I have been playing with Jokes and His is too mighty to hold in the hand like a Pen and His is the Pistol Shot Answer that brings blood to the brain And-- What can can be possible be possible in a minor universe in which you can see G.o.d by sniffing the gas in a cotton?
The answer to be taken in reverse & Doubled Math ematically both both ways. ways.
Am I a sinner?
There are hard & easy universes. This is neither.
(If I close my eyes will I regain consciousness?) That"s the Final Question -- with all the old churchbells ringing and bus pickup snuffles & crack of iron whips inside cylinders & squeal of brakes and old crescendos of responsive demiurgic ecstasy whispering in streets of ear -- and when was it Not ever answered in the Affir- mative? Saith the Lord?
A MAGIC UNIVERSE Flies & crickets & the sound of buses & my stupid beard.
But what"s Magic?
Is there Sorrow in Magic?
Is Magic one of my boyscout creations?
Am I responsible? I with my flop?
Could Threat happen to Magic?
Yes! this the one universe in which there is is threat to magic, by threat to magic, by writing while high.
A Universe in which I am condemned to write statements.
"Ignorant Judgements Create Mistaken Worlds--"
and this one is joined in Indic union to Affirm with laughing eyes -- The world is as we see it, Male & Female, pa.s.sing thru the years, as has before & will, perhaps with all its countless pearls & b.l.o.o.d.y noses and I poor stupid All in G am stuck with that old Choice -- Ya, c.r.a.p, what Hymn to seek, & in what tongue, if this"s the most I can requite from Consciousness? -- "That I can skim? & put in words?
Could skim it faster with more juice -- could skim a crop with Death, perchance -- yet never know in this old world.
Will know in Death?
And before?
Will in Another know.
And in another know.
And in another know.
And Stop conceiving worlds!
says Philip Whalen (My Savior!) (oh what sn.o.bbery!) (as if he cd save Anyone) -- At least least, he won"t understand.
I lift my finger in the air to create a universe he won"t understand, full of sadness.
-- finally staring straight ahead in surprise & recollection into the mirror of the Hotel Commercio room.
Time repeats itself. Including this consciousness, which has seen itself before -- thus the locust-whistle of antiquity"s night.w.a.tch in my eardrum . . .
I propounded a final question, and heard a series of final answers.
What is G.o.d? for instance, asks the answer?
And whatever else can the replier reply but reply?
Whatever the nature of mind, that the nature of both both question and answer. question and answer.
& yet one wants to live in a single single universe universe Does one?
Must it be one?
Why, as with the Jews must the G.o.d be One?
O what does the concept ONE mean?
IT"S MAD!
G.o.d IS ONE!
IS X IS MEANINGLESS -- ADONOI -- IS A JOKE -- THE HEBREWS ARE WRONG -- (CRIST & BUDDA ATTEST, also wrongly!) What is One but Formation of mind?
arbitrary madness! 6000 years Spreading out in all directions simultaneously -- I forgive both good & ill & I seek nothing, like a painted savage with spear crossed by orange black & white bands!
"I found the Jivaros & was entrapped in their universe"
I"m scribbling nothings.
Page upon page of profoundest nothing, as scribed the Ancient Hebe, when he wrote Adonoi Echad or One -- all to amuse, make money, or deceive -- Let Wickedness be Me and this the worst of all the universes!
Not the worst! Not Flame!
I can"t stand that -- (Yes that"s for Somebody Else!
Yet I accept O Catfaced G.o.d, whatever comes! It"s me!
I am the Flame, etc.
O Gawd!
Pistol shot! Crack!
Circusmaster"s whip -- IMPERFECT!
and a soul is d.a.m.ned to h.e.l.l!
And the churchbell rings!