tag cloud poem VI – anyone’s eyes

Tags

1960s, 2014, 7*, air, Allen Ginsberg, anxiety, beach, cafe, cars, earrings, earth, east, Eastbourne, eating, echo, economics, Eda, education, educational behaviourism, Edward Hopper, eggs, Eglinton Hill, Eiffel Tower, elastic bands, electric, elipse, elm, Eltham, emergence, Emma Peel, employment, emptiness, empty, endeavour, engine, Enlightenment, ennui, Eternity, Europe, evaluation, evening, evidence, exchange, existence, expectation, experience, exploitation, expression, eyebrow, eyes, faces, growth, Have, identity, journey, landscape, life, looking, pointlessness, school, society, sound, tag cloud poem, teaching, time, war

 

 

 

while earrings twinkle
the earth turns inexorably
east

in all the cafés along Eastbourne front
eating happens with clak but no
echo

economics doesn’t explain it
all said Eda* but I didn’t understand her then or now
despite my education

despite the educational behaviourism
I teach in schools of tomorrow’s children creating
life as treacled as an Edward Hopper

look what happened to Ginsberg’s eggs!
the journey from Eglinton Hill
to the Eiffel Tower took ten years

by elastic band and is still incomplete
because the electric was not current,
but elipse, and no one factored that in

well, just look at the elm which
grows into the ground and
only in Eltham is the emergence apparent

and Emma Peel with a face like a plate
in permanent employment modelling different styles of emptiness
but stuck and empty herself within that very decade

I don’t know: the endeavour should never be
the engine because where would you get off
for the Enlightenment?

ennui the constant air of Eternity
drifting across landscape of Europe despite
scar and plenty

the evaluation has still not been made
no matter how late into evening you wait
the evidence will always peel and flake

the exchange will already look to the next
the existence will writhe on the Utah beaches
to tailor expectation like Emperor’s New Clothes

experience is common but not the denominator
exploitation works best when dressed as expression
with only a wisp of anxiety betrayed by an eyebrow

just look deep into anyone’s eyes

 

*Eda was someone I fell soppily in fatuation with during the first year of university, but I was so naïve I didn’t know what it was and didn’t know what to do with it; I still don’t now

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

air & looking wormhole: on sitting / in front of / a hedge
anxiety & teaching wormhole: what I am about to say is true / what I just said was a lie
beach wormhole: gazing at the night / as my eyes passed the jagged hole / my head disappeared
cars wormhole: cold wind
Eastbourne & Dionne Warwick wormhole: promenade
echo wormhole: 1963
economics wormhole: 20th century
education wormhole: just saying, is all – III
Edward Hopper wormhole: Dr Strange #6-13
Eglinton Hill & evening wormhole: ‘“ruddy crows!” / said my Dad …’
Eiffel Tower wormhole: parc du Champ-de-Mars
emergence wormhole: vagued
emptiness & time wormhole: posture
evaluation wormhole: the View: from Here to the Learning Objective to the Learning Horizon
eyes wormhole: the Buddha head in an antique shop
faces wormhole: titanic
Ginsberg wormhole: multifarious: the Dark Knight Returns (1986)
Have & war wormhole: plethora: the Dark Knight Strikes Again (2002)
identity & life wormhole: letters to Mum I – a walk / and talk
pointlessness wormhole: first a mishap then clear vision
society wormhole: introducing / the stranger
sound wormhole: open window
tag cloud poem wormhole: tag cloud poem V – draft-ness

Dr Strange #6-13

Tags

1975, 2012, 9*, being, change, continuity, doing, Dormammu, Dr Strange, dream, Edward Hopper, elipse, emptiness, Eternity, Gene Colan, Have, humanity, Nightmare, Paul Simon, reality, society, Steely Dan, Steve Englehart

Dr Strange #6-13 (Feb 1975-April 1976); Marvel; writer: Steve Englehart; artist: Gene Colan

 

 

 

                                I

            the always-aslant encounter
                                of humans and street
                      making their lives
                                in the grounds they see
            in the grounds they have been given
                                           constant encounter
                      as variable as the daily

                                           for those who see
            elliptical to the happenstance
                                the skyline to the treeline
                                           the glide to the cobble
                      the palm to the point
                                the both-step-aside to avoid each other’s path
                                and collide
                                           Hopper saw it
and Colan saw it and Strange had already
                                stepped into it
                                           stepped through it and out again

                      moment

                                           but now
            his pupils are that much more round
                      the trashcan tilted
                                the better to see now
                                           the street
                                                       the face in the orb implied
            that everything had changed and that
                                things
would never be the same again

                                continued …

                                II

            … things are the same again
                      always have
                      always had
                                the second half of the twentieth century
            incorporated it
                                you either had it or you wanted it
                      either way it fed the corporation
                      everyone fed the corporation
                                           by wealth by health
                                                       by belief
                                this is the way things are
                                           dwelt at the very heart of the world
                                                               turning growing and fiery
            there comes a time
                      when the power
                                and the beauty become elliptical
                                           to each other
                                           to themselves
                                                       then chaos will come
                      you mark my words
            thinks the aged Genghis high on the edge of the world
                                aged enough in life
                      to see beyond self:             there is nothing there
there is nothing there

                                III

                                a colossus
            strides effortlessly across canyons and generations
                      fed by the needs of billions
                                engorged enough to consume
                                itself
                      it speaks with a flaming head
unstable
                      too much
                                           too much that
                                it will disperse itself even as it reaches
                      the needs of billions
                                flooded through a world of veins
                                           like tumbling yellow fat
                                                       the mother is bound
                      the father is blind
                                and only all the words of worlds
                                                       will speak
                                           while Strange and devotion
                                           expand through dimensions
            growing alarmingly through the stages of their lives
                                quick to get there while
                      wanting it all
                                a son sits ‘by the blackened wall
                                           he does it all he thinks he’s died
                      and gone to heaven’*

                                IV

                                there are ellipses yes
            but Strange has long known that they are doorways too
                                           he can step through them all
                                in the twinkle
                      of anyone’s eye
                                           he can see the aches
                                of option and perspective
            he can see the nightmares
                                of polarity and stasis
                      bounding towards him
                      but never approaching
                                           me             ME

                                his own speech
                                becomes the twinkle in his eye
                                           he steps
            and with a flourish
                      the sky takes a form of the whole universe
                                to talk:

                                V**

                      ‘communication
                                           has undone you
                                you know of all others’ success
            and see only your own failure
                                you will not have ignorance
                                           you would have all knowledge
                      all the words of worlds speak
                                           and from each word
            you draw more closely in upon yourself
                                unable to settle on shared or
                                           compromise ‘… stand
            on their differences
                      and shoot at the moon’ ***
                                each man must win
                                so all men must lose
                                           all expansion
                                                       must take the turn of contraction
                      you cannot have
                                           sustained growth
                                ‘first comes spring and summer
                      but then we have fall and winter … Ben’ ****

                                VI

                                the twinkle
                      becomes my eye
                                           I see my life
            from inside the many faces I have worn
                                as I contrive power and plan escape
                      over/from/death/life
                                vainglorious
                                                               compulsive
            petulant

                      and failed every time I act
                                [and compose]
                                the more I do
                                           the less I get anywhere
                                and the more
                                                               my selves multiply and reside
                                I could lose
                      the whole world
                                           through my asides and schemes
                                                       my power and play
                                all of the ellipses spinning
                                           to conjure my face
            spinning fit to vortex to hold my face to the world
                                           and the more I am
                      a sorcerer supreme the more
                                I am grotesque
                                           the more I gestate the mad messiah-killers
                      in the backrush and tail-
                                           spin

                                                       I hadn’t thought
            I hadn’t given
                      I hadn’t laughed
                                I hadn’t loved
                                           another

                                VII

too late
            planet Earth is no more
                      for all my fighting and struggle
            I have achieved only the madness of Mordo
                      the whole span and play of existence
                                           ssspunnn
                                into its opposite:
                                                               being
            death
                                ovum
                                           rebirth
                                everything
                                           is the same as it ever was but
classic classic comicbook
                      it was all just a dream
                                it is everything that is dream

 

 

 

* Steely Dan, The Royal Scam, The Royal Scam, 1976
** Steve Englehart, Dr Strange#10, Oct 1975, from p.15-16
*** Paul Simon, Cars Are Cars, Hearts and Bones, 1983
**** Being There (1979), dir: Hal Ashby, Chance the Gardener

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

being wormhole: what comes first … // the poem or the content … // the shamatha or the vipashyana … // the posture … // or the sitting?
change & Dr Strange & & Edward Hopper Gene Colan wormhole: Dr Strange #6 (Feb 1975)
doing wormhole: writing is not a container of reality / it is being the reality / itself
dream wormhole: dream / 150910
emptiness & Have wormholes: poessay IV
reality wormhole: the bottom line
society wormhole: poessay II