Susanna and the Magical Orchestra — Condition of the Heart

A song that has completely broken my heart this fall.

the pages turned blown against the wind

lying by the riverside
the pages turned
blown against the wind,
it happened again
the new beginning wrote itself

kingdom come

It’s like the fingerprints in the ice blocks melted away

and i went stargazing into the purple canyons

where i found in the wet depths of the river the

letters of my name floating around.

 

what the devil of all hell is this.

there is a chicken coop in the

canyon creek,

with the letters of my name floating around.

stupid banana jesus and mary magdaline,

what the devil is all of this.

 

my hair curls around the letters

as i go swimming in the lord’s funny business

working my way through the sun gas waterbeds

 

i am completely beholden to this trove.

Wheel

The rivers are swelling,
spilling down the water wheel
against my breastbone.

It shares a glow with the moon’s thin air,
treads softly, aching and
creaking around.
No matter its trickle, it
brings the water through.

Tonight, though, my heart is crying,
Its tears swelling upward, to my throat.
Its memory, its print, shines far
beyond this one land, this one time,
To distant places, other spheres.
It does not speak — no. It turns, gives, receives,
Round, and round, tugging the edges
But moving round the center,
Dousing its panes for ever — for who would
stop this embrace?

These hearts — all these crazy, fiendish,
joyful hearts — are winding water around the wheel,
Breathing life to the little homes aside the
river, and beyond, where our love dwells.

– Sept. 2012 –

Untitled

We create

   visions under the microscope

   centers of blue-green harmonica

   oysters in the trap dust sand

   The Nephilian giants

   stand far above the burial mountains

      of Ireland

   As the people look and wonder,

   Where does it come from?

    The turtle pushes off and floats away.

– 2010 –

With unquiet pause

 

The spitting embers of refined madness

Glow particular, with unquiet pause.

Behind the paper, 99 percent of the world is

reaching out to me

And I know the worst might be ahead.

 

There is no stopping the

business of being alive

Rocking, back and forth, back and forth,

It waits til the time is ripe.

When it goes, it lights

Up, heat, fire, smoke,

The pills like rain try to stop the thing

But fire and earth are too strong

 

I would like to know

What it feels like to sleep in this bed

Without the eyes of the clock

Staring down, daring me to stare back.

My old friend, the demon of the poem-book

Picks a fight with me.

Color me an idea, he beckons.

Red, beware. Orange, proceed with caution,

Yellow, check again, amber threads of ambiguity

Green, oh green, of great and ancient spirits, those

Who protect the gates

To what can truly be known.

Blue for protection and pride

Purple, the priest, deity alive

Into the mist of silver, black grey high night.

It is true that my house speaks.

It is true that God speaks.

 

– KAE, 2011 –

For Francesca and Kelson — Aug. 11, 2012

 

In a chestnut grows a peanut

little, brittle, sweet and warm

Glowing with life almighty,

Shoring up against the storm.

When weeks turn to bring the arrival of

the beast of a holy day,

the embers of a beating heart

burst glory through the bay.

 

Forget the tumble drum of

every-everyness till then.

Be still, be wise, be gracious,

find your will to carry them.

Tender the touch to feather that

fine hair in palm of hand.

The wishing-be of righting she, he,

brings you to fertile land.

 

Cry, baby! Cry! Cry wide open

the will to live alive.

Feel the breath, the air, that humble stare

Toward your chestnut’s eye.

It will come to pass,

Life goes on, at last

For moments quake sometimes.

It’s good to be where one can see

Past all that looking-glass.

 

Draw your love from sea-wells, tree-wells,

be-wells, day and night.

Yes, moments quake, and life won’t wait.

Sweet creatures, now, alight!

– KAE

The fascination of what’s difficult

 

The fascination of what’s difficult

Has dried the sap out of my veins, and rent

Spontaneous joy and natural content

Out of my heart. There’s something ails our colt

That must, as if it had not holy blood

Nor on Olympus leaped from cloud to cloud,

Shiver under the lash, strain, sweat and jolt

As though it dragged road metal. My curse on plays

That have to be set up in fifty ways,

On the day’s war with every knave and dolt,

Theatre business, management of men.

I swear before the dawn comes round again

I’ll find the stable and pull out the bolt.

– W.B. Yeats

people of history, on t-ttr

jesus christ?

newest: sigmund freud?

I’ll begin to quote Wendell Berry now, if you don’t mind.

“Kindness from readers is something that no essayist (and no writer of any other kind) has a right to expect. The kindness I have received from readers I count as the only profit from my work that is entirely net. I am always grateful for it and often am deeply moved by it.

“But kindness is not––is never––the same as complete agreement. An essayist not only has no right to expect complete agrement but has a certain responsibility to ward it off. If you tell me, dear reader, that you agree with me completely, then I must suspect one or both of us of dishonesty. I must reserve the right, after all, to disagree with myself.”

- Preface to Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community, by Wendell Berry