.
The Isle of the Dead: Arnold Böcklin, 1883 (Nationalgalerie, Berlin)
Fuck you in slang and conventional English.
Fuck you in lost and neglected lingoes.
Fuck you hungry and sated; faded, pock marked and defaced.
Fuck you with orange rind, fennel and anchovy paste.
Fuck you with rosemary and thyme, and fried green olives on the side.
Fuck you humidly and icily.
Fuck you farsightedly and blindly.
Fuck you nude and draped in stolen finery.
Fuck you while cells divide wildly and birds trill.
Thank you for barring me from his bedside while he was ill.
Fuck you puce and chartreuse.
Fuck you postmodern and prehistoric.
Fuck you under the influence of opium, codeine, laudanum and paregoric.
Fuck every real and imagined country you fancied yourself princess of.
Fuck you on feast days and fast days, below and above.
Fuck you sleepless and shaking for nineteen nights running.
Fuck you ugly and fuck you stunning.
Fuck you shipwrecked on the barren island of your bed.
Fuck you marching in lockstep in the ranks of the dead.
Fuck you at low and high tide.
And fuck you astride
bathrooms, or kitchens.
Fuck you in gasps and whispered benedictions.
And fuck these curses, however heartfelt and true,
that bind me, till I forgive you, to you.
Seated female nude with extended right arm: Egon Schiele (1890-1918), 1910 (private collection)
Amy Gerstler: Fuck You Poem # 45, 2003, from Ghost Girl (2004)
8 comments:
Well okay then
let us cut
as they say
to the chase.
We are well and truly fucked
until
in conclusion
we can hope to be
well and truly forgiven.
A fucked up commitment
when I signed on
to excavate the ancient items
& all
little wrapped up mummies--
static, mumbling, blind
even Gran Apacheria--
yes that sort of mood
my poems
I chased them here and there
but ultimately did not want
to catch up to them.
Because then what? Fucked.
Who was that person
that wrote them
or is it whom?
How
to decide this
who is it that
stares at the collection
gathering dust.
To fuck with a mummy
is said to bring bad luck
the curse and all
breaking it.
Egypt gets very mad.
I see I am the mummy
all dressed up
eye makeup
various signs on outer surfaces
pointing the way
(a jawbone in the wrong place)
to more stones
they have become my eyes
a stone is in my ear
the pillow they gave me
was certainly not large enough
you can guess the rest
it was not quite restful
turning into a stone
so I rowed to the island
more graves! Can you imagine
it looked inviting enough
with all the mummies banished
boats with special oars
I thought I saw some of my poems
in these little boats
or were they anchors?
It was smooth sailing to the Isle of the Dead. I did not really care for their music but this was not the main thing about it. Mostly, it was very quiet, the water like glass, the cedars had grown quite large. They said there was no room for my bones, not even a small corner. It was so small. I saw some monks’ cells carved into the cliff. Well, if there grew corn here and finagled irrigation ditches then there were possibilities not apparent at first glance. I grew hopeful. That happens a lot at the end. Exhausting anticipation, regrets about grammar, and all the rest.
September 7th Cake
recipe:
http://web.missouri.edu/~jcmfy2/recipes/September_7th_Cake.html
Let us cut to the cake
let it chase us
all night long
daring the words
darling.
Hazen,
Our last forlorn hope.
Susan,
The September 7th cake, that is the mere contemplation of it, made it seem worth living until September 8th. And then 9th and so on.
At the critical point, our sides DID buckle a bit... yet we did not worry.
Had we only been fortified with a suitable range of pan-racks, things might well have turned out differently.
"If you have a turntable for decorating cakes or a lazy Susan, place the cake plate on it."
A lazy Susan, one thing we do not have to worry about!
I see they do not list
any Cream of Tartar
in this concoction
but it certainly rises
to the important occasion
of September 7th
requiring just
a small amount of instant
plus the chips.
Thanks for this. Reminds me of Koch's "Sleeping with Women"... technically, of course. Good to hear of Amy Gerstler again. Where has she been all this while: sleeping under Santa Monica pier? Strong poem!
J Tranter
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