1. |
The Stirring Daughter
03:12
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But I was bold, I sat in bed
and drooled from out of my drooling head
until another saw what I was doing
And soon it came they spoke my name
I heard it twice and it stayed the same,
my lungs were coming undone from their gluing
Iris rise up and take up your bed!
Pick up your soiled pillow! Lift your lolling head!
“A daughter's place is in the bed,
in shutting up or playing dead.
There's no more I can do by definition.”
I tried to rise and struck the floor
– and soon became a spastic whore –
I laid there in my fluids, weakly grasping.
It was only then that I knew when
I first had given up and then
I understood the scrape behind my raspings.
I settled down, was covered up
And don't think I'll be getting up
Still I try to clot the atmosphere with laughter.
But nothing but a stale trickle
of breath as sodden as a pickle
pushes, pulsing through my teeth to ever after.
Iris rise up and take up your bed!
Pick up your soiled pillow! Lift your lolling head!
A daughter's place is in the bed,
in shutting up or playing dead.
There's no more I can do by definition.
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2. |
Jewels of Salome
03:02
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Clang and clink and chime and jingle!
Topaz titters, garnets tinkle.
The jangling jewels of Salome!
A father loves his daughter.
"For you, the moon and all its cinders!
All of Hades' waters!"
Clang and clink and chime and jingle!
Bellies heave and sinews tingle.
"Father father, is that all?
Can you afford a kiss or laugh?
The old man makes his daughter blush;
how many halves can your kingdom have?"
Moonstone, malachite, amethyst, moldavite,
A bed of thatch and fattening fleas,
a headboard of hematite.
Clang and clink and chime and jingle!
Topaz titters, garnets tinkle.
The jangling jewels of Salome!
A father loves his daughter.
"For you the hides of all my sons,
My darling dancing daughter!"
Clang and clink and chime and jingle!
Bellies heave and sinews tingle.
"Father father, kingdoms wane
Jewels can only clatter,
But bring me something I can kiss forever!
Bring him on a platter."
Moonstone, malachite, amethyst, moldavite,
A bed of thatch and fattening fleas,
a headboard of hematite.
Clang and clink and chime and jingle!
Topaz titters, garnets tinkle.
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3. |
The Devil's Pallbearers
03:07
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The white oak stretched as it climbed up
through balmy heaven's crypt
The old rain peeled our faces back;
we licked our dirtied lips.
Gone is he who suckled us,
whose udders filled our pails.
Who can call the devil now
to drag his hairy tail?
We raised the pine box shoulder high,
the soot clung to our thighs.
We couldn't tell our tears from rain
and filth was in our eyes.
The devil was so poor and bent -
he limped and scratched his way
and now he barely fills the box
that we have borne away.
Gone is he who suckled us,
whose udders filled our pails.
Who can call the devil now
to drag his hairy tail?
And here we climb the final ridge
above the gorge and vale
To bring the lonely body back
to where his father hides his grail.
Gone forever! Gone and gone.
With tears I fill my pail.
Who can call the devil now
to drag his hairy tail?
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4. |
The Lazarus Men
03:01
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The Lazarus Men
The coughing rain forgot its name,
the sun grew scared to burn
And fire went out upon a world
that hung in space as if to turn.
The factories like shattered clocks
could move no more with time
And every lung in every chest
was pierced against the spine.
To speak the name of Lazarus!
To till into the barren moon....
Who has called the Lazarus men
so late, when earth lies breathless?
Why raise them up when all is gone?
Why make them both so deathless?
It was then two men, two Lazarus men
came riding from the poles
Upon two beasts of vulgar cast
In search of errant souls.
The coughing rain forgot its name,
the sun grew scared to burn
And fire went out upon a world
that hung in space as if to turn.
Who has called the Lazarus men
so late, when earth lies breathless?
Why raise them up when all is gone?
Why make them both so deathless?
To speak the name of Lazarus!
To till into the barren moon....
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5. |
Walpurgisnacht
03:16
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Another thing lies broken
That I thought could never die.
Another failure forming –
I want to shut my eyes.
Life shivers from my body
And every way lies closed.
The comforts dry and wither
Can’t keep my face composed.
I knew that it would hurt
but not in all these ways.
Those things I tried to keep
Die more with every day.
And to think there is an ending,
a long plateau of rest,
a single night of tearstains,
an explosion through the chest.
The loneliness is caustic,
I feel it scratch my face.
Life is the cruelest gift –
It wakes you up to waste.
There’s no one here to listen
And few still know my name.
There’s only vacant wanting.
I turn from loss to shame.
Dead things becomes more distant
Gravestones lose their names
I call into my past
It can never be the same.
And to think there is an ending,
a long plateau of rest,
a single night of tearstains ,
an explosion through the chest.
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6. |
The Owl Duke
03:18
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The Owl Duke fell upon a rodent
dressed in mange and mire.
The mouse was only pennies high;
the Owl Duke flapped like fire!
The rodent raised its slender voice
in speech he hoped that all fowl knew
and taunted him, that stately duke!
with words he hoped were true.
"Ho thief! With all your steely toes
you take the lives of many!
You rend the rat and mole and split
the skunk, the frog, and jenny."
"And you may take this mammal's meat
whole or haunch by haunch,
but you're too weak to take us all
all gathered in a bunch."
The Owl Duke smiled upon the rodent,
"You're no mean or common vermin!
Most would plead to stay my claws
but you prefer this sermon."
"I didn't come to this renown
by birth or noble blows,
but crept the shadows tearing faces
from the bones of sleeping foes"
"I nearly love you for your words
And have already ate,
but I didn't become the Duke of Owls
by chasing morsels from my plate."
"Ho thief! With all your steely toes
you take the lives of many
You rend the rat and mole and split
the skunk, the frog, and jenny."
"I'll rest with rats that came before
inside your feathered chest,
but when you die our bones will meet
and rot inside your dirty nest."
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7. |
Omega Lady
04:35
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She scrawled an omega across her brow
and vowed to give it meaning,
then walked until she met the dog
that haunts the sea of seeming.
"A day ago I took some lampblack
Placed this letter on my face.
Can you guess its silver essence
Give it time or give it place?"
It answered, "No one here can know
before they've known decaying."
"Here tongues cannot convey their sense
all words are braying"
-
She pressed her toes an hour's trot
away from the salt and sail.
She happened on some eager children
eating from a patch of snails.
"A day ago I took some lampblack
Placed this letter on my face.
Can you guess its silver essence
Give it time or give it place?"
They answered, "No one here can know
before they've known decaying
Here tongues cannot convey their sense
all words are braying"
-
She wandered to a wooden church
and opened both its doors;
Inside before a silver monstrance
a man of cloth crept on his fours.
"A day ago I took some lampblack
Placed this letter on my face.
Can you guess its silver essence
Give it time or give it place?"
He answered, "No one here can know
before they've known decaying
Here tongues cannot convey their sense
all words are braying"
-
She ran until she saw a mound
with stones propped at its crest.
And realized now how weak she'd grown
as she fell upon her breast.
"A day ago I took some lampblack
Placed this letter on my face.
"I do not think it has an essence
nor a time and not a place."
"Let nothing answer, nothing come
and nothing speak again."
She spoke, too stiff to feel the rain
that washed the lampblack from her skin.
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8. |
Alien Bee
02:26
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The day had yellowed with despair
and murky clouds of pollen.
Her noise -- a thousand buzzards' voice!
Her hind sacs filled till swollen!
Alien Bee, The honey from the sky!
Alien Bee, The hive outside of time.
She choked the air with allergens;
Full half the earth died rasping!
And champed her twitching mandibles
at our excited gasping.
The world beyond is combed with drones
who chew and spit their wax.
Out from the afterlife of space
She tests her sting against our backs.
Alien Bee, The honey from the sky!
Alien Bee, The hive outside of time.
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9. |
Tiresias in Love
03:18
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Take my eyes or all my years!
Take away my tongue!
Just let me split the entwined serpents
I split when I was young.
I knew a man when I was a man,
I knew a woman too,
and while a woman knew them both
one was nectar, one was dew.
Dew can wet a thirsty tongue
dry and cracked with fissures,
while nectar burns the self alive with
pulsing deathless pleasures.
Take my eyes or all my years!
Take away my tongue!
Just let me split the entwined serpents
I split when I was young.
Today the eagle tore the pidgeon
from flight. I know this omen!
Even so, I loved the best
when I loved as a woman.
So frost my pupils to my lids --
I'm sure you gods need sight.
But give these dry breasts life again
Oh, pity! Pity this poor wight!
I need to feel it all again!
Those seven years weren't long.
Afterwards, my loins went weak as
my prophetic arts grew strong.
Tiresias In Love
Tiresias In Love
I knew a man when I was a man
I knew a woman too.
And I am old. And I'm a fool.
Who trades nectar for the dew?
Tiresias In Love
Tiresias In Love
Tiresias In Love
Tiresias In Love
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10. |
The Blessed Child
02:55
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When you look toward the moon
if at night or if at noon
High up in its lovely place,
Behold the blessed child's face!
The angel put the child away
inside the furnace every day
and tinkled with her brazen thimbles
till the child was bronze as cymbal.
She took its bones to build a cradle
from a hole above its navel.
She sang to pass the slowing time
and stuffed the child with myrrh and thyme.
So when you look toward the moon
If at night or if at noon
High up in its lovely place,
Behold the blessed child's face!
She forged two ornamental eyes
to make the child seem bright and wise
and licked its face until it shone
Bright as heaven's burnished throne.
The angel put the child away
inside the furnace every day
and tinkled with her brazen thimbles
till the child was bronze as cymbal.
So when you look toward the moon
If at night or if at noon
High up in its lovely place,
Behold the blessed child's face!
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11. |
||||
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Another thing lies broken
That I thought could never die.
Another failure forming –
I want to shut my eyes.
Life shivers from my body
And every way lies closed.
The comforts dry and wither
Can’t keep my face composed.
I knew that it would hurt
but not in all these ways.
Those things I tried to keep
Die more with every day.
And to think there is an ending,
a long plateau of rest,
a single night of tearstains,
an explosion through the chest.
The loneliness is caustic,
I feel it scratch my face.
Life is the cruelest gift –
It wakes you up to waste.
There’s no one here to listen
And few still know my name.
There’s only vacant wanting.
I turn from loss to shame.
Dead things becomes more distant
Gravestones lose their names
I call into my past
It can never be the same.
And to think there is an ending,
a long plateau of rest,
a single night of tearstains ,
an explosion through the chest.
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Sumerias Fain Kenova, West Virginia
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