285.
Life stops at any moment but the
story goes on
that’s what’s wrong with it, this
imaginary present tense
weirder than any future hold me in
your hands
because I was war and got over it or
praised the seen
read the original clay of Gilgamesh
with your fingers
there is no scholarship but the
waking heart
for saying is all and thinking is few
those dim magistrates dismiss all
evidence
if you believe your eyes you’d
believe anything
I’m an agnostic when it comes to me
I speak to the simplest things
because they answer me
the question I really meant for
you.
286.
Smash the tablets at the gate
to speak in the tongues of all of you
I need to answer what you do not ask
isn’t that what polis is for
the heads to hang crowns on and
laurel wreaths
rhapsodic recitation of the obvious
smooth as religion
but it’s hard in summer when the gods
are far
we linger in our bodies no more sense
than the day’s news
now I put on my father’s green coat
and speak another language taught by
the mirror
seen through tears as he went away.
