David Hadbawnik's Blog, page 5

Electricity

for Alice Notley

I am not this person.

Not that one, either. Wanted to be

god of something,

fell short or exceeded

the word count, became pure

sound making the world

as I go. Became

electricity, glowing

dots and the shapes

they form into all

that we call language, in-

forming ourselves

Numbers

One more day to get through.

But they are all the same,

who knew? The way

numbers interchange. K’s

daughter said three was five,

five four, and three two,

going by letters. By letters

night’s day, I’m you.

Morning’s a texture we wake to,

make this refrain

Turn

Is it enough to love words,

love the things they stand for,

turn

one over, house, animal,

lover. Warmth, food,

self, roof. Is it enough

to wander through them, leap

from one to the other

out of or ahead of

one’s self, words

& a hand sorting

among them

Letter

Learning to love again in

fits and starts. Books

due today. Waking to birdsong

and soft rain, the house

already restless. I’ll

go first. The thin edge

of the letter’s all

we have, crossing the t

left to right or right

to left, depending

Road

Hill studded with tombstones

all roads circle back to

as we run. “We are only mouth,”

one says, “Personal pronoun

trapped in the mind,” another answers.

We hear them calling

each to each as the road circles

back again, names waving

like flags in the crisp

morning air. We become

gesture and glance, rhetoric

rattling in bones, blood

ebbing and flowing till

tide breaks

Power

With a subtle movement I take off

the top of my head, usurping

poetry’s power, feeling the smooth

stuff ooze out on my fingers.

Usurping poetry’s power, I

make new the very air,

set everything ringing,

I do not mean but be

and usurping poetry’s power

I am not in ideas

but things.

Watching

Things I don’t do because someone

is watching me. Lines

I don’t cross. Fish swim

backwards against

no current. Angels

come into my room quietly

turn and leave.

Things I don’t do because

everybody is watching.

A dream I don’t dream

or dreaming, forget. And wake

to find myself watched,

watching.

Extend

I like to micromanage inconsequential affairs

and leave the important stuff

for others to worry about, like a woodpecker

working away at the crotch of a tree.

I like to leave empty bottles lying around

and pretend they’re wind chimes arranged

just so to catch the sunlight

crouching outside the windows.

I like to curl up and imagine

I extend all the way back to whenever

not unlike the quiet breathing

of small warm hidden things.

Seeds

A cluster of stuck

together seeds stumbled

upon in the woods

as a boy, copiousness

of the word ‘the’

at that age, the seeds

delicate pungent and

so many hanging there

as the boy stumbles

into himself, heavy

with sick, too careful

by half

Desire

Desire to run

backwards until

there is too much

and forwards

is shorter.

Desire to skip

over the gaps

just makes more

such as here

and here.

Desire to be

on the cusp of

or having

completed

what’s next.