Found this review at Falling out of a Ford Galaxie at 40 mph on a hairpin turn
Wanting nothing, watch this, old man, matchbooks and habits,
washing machine, bald tires
(you’re especially fond of old, bald tires)
& look up into yr
casual beliefs, blankets, bag of
popcorn, bag of chicken, bag of
tootsie rolls, dark-blue dark-brown old man socks
the sound of yr shoe in rain, the squelch
on, hum something maybe native, something
within the cells the dryer lint, and a receipt for pepperoni
the list caught left-right left-right & our DNA is what
is the racket like the special way that
you don’t approve of music or treat the mail nice
to see who’s taken what or thrust what
or hold that
I feel yr pants pocket slipping
& so
*
we say it gets
ugly, you’ll say
but still you’d like to take that road out
in yr gum blue truck and buy
(the list, mama)
watermelon, pickles
ice cream
Henry Ford,
and the cat with trees
kids glove
pistoleras
give the butcher some money
(boucher)
how nice
anyway
it’s so harrowing harrowing harrowing
*
now get the fuck out
———————————————————————————
postscript: remedial like a picnic
the sign said $300 fine for dumping & so what. the idea of flat rocks reduced to stream fodder, the idea of ‘mill’ given to old baptisms & weird hymns sung until labor day. the idea that in a minute there’s nobody where the men were. & the girl wasn’t yr problem. though nobody wanted to see her, you wanted to pull her out & pull on the eye-shadow & the lipstick. & make her & then take that tube o that aimless slim thing in yr hand & wave yr flag: o good boy.
sorry, Pablo
i think it probably sucks, but it’s troubled me, nonetheless.
because:
A) i think everything (i think) sounds better in a foreign tongue. almost always. (especially in Italian!)
B) i never really ‘learned’ Italian. so this was almost like rote science, like math or some shit. which is (or seems) very different from notions i think most of us hold about the liberal arts. and esp. writing–creative writing–and esp. poetry. isn’t it supposed to be some sort of privileged (i.e. hieratical) dookie, perched up there? ahem (cough) well isn’t it? i mean, read the last couple of issues of Poetry. good lord.
C) i really like the last line better in Italian! (it even sounds like f***ing)
hence, i think Dante, et. al were really some lucky fucks…
LXXVIII
Non ho mai più, non ho sempre. Nell’arena
la vittoria lasciò le sue orme perse.
Sono un pover’uomo disposto ad amare i suoi simili.
Non so chi sei. Ti amo. Non do, non vendo le spine.
Qualcuno forse saprà che non tessei corone
sanguinante, che combattei la burla,
e che di verità riempii l’alta marea della mia anima.
Rimborsai la viltà con colombi.
No ho mai perché distinto
fui, sono, sarò. E in nome
del mio cangiante amore proclamo la purezza.
La morte é solo la pietra dell’oblio.
Ti amo, bacio sulla tua bocca la gioia.
Raccogliamo la legna. Faremo un fuoco sulla montagna.
***
for those of you lucky enough to speak/read Spanish, here’s a link to the original:
and here’s an ‘ok’ English trans for the rest:
I have no never-again, I have no always. In the sand
victory abandoned its footprints.
I am a poor man willing to love his fellow men.
I don’t know who you are. I love you. I don’t give away thorns,
and I don’t sell them.
Maybe someone will know that I didn’t weave crowns
to draw blood; that I fought against mockery;
that I did fill the high tide of my soul with the truth.
I repaid vileness with doves.
I have no never, because I was different —
was, am, will be. And in the name
of my ever-changing love I proclaim a purity.
Death is only the stone of oblivion.
I love you, on your lips I kiss happiness itself.
Let’s gather firewood. We’ll light a fire on the mountain.
–trans. Stephen Tapscott
blogger, wtf
Ahh…. the new Literary Salt is out, with a cool piece by Paula, and some others.
Looks like a fantastic issue, I’ll be reading.