JOE PULVER
RUNE GRAMMOFON POEM [9]
every l e t t e r
roars
like the moon
drunk
on two dollars worth of blues
each is serious
came out of the womb
that way
each has
forgotten other words
confused them
with feelings
that only occur in photographs
every letter
has spent time
under a flower
murmuring
about movement
and
knots
I’d like to sleep
but
every L E T T E R
is shaped like
a handful of words
RUNE GRAMMOFON POEM [U.N/umbered)))) )
try to keep your cigarette lit in this light / go ahead / try / try / line up all your self-portraits and wine bottles / you can put them over there with the wind / the caravan departs soon / spit out the sand / c’mon all of it now / even the traces / did it do any good / go on now / dismantle the sun / can you do it / try to sleep after your nights in the bottles of anxiety / go ahead / try / try / no room for the holes in your pockets out here on the edge / you can tap at the limits all you like / but the gangs care little for your adventures in-between sultry and overload / they’re too busy etching all the white out of the flat mysteries / too concerned with keeping moonlight in the sacred urn of smoke / so go ahead / scream into the starry night / who’ll hear you / there’s no indian summer waiting under an umbrella in the rain / not here / so what next / dreams of the right words / not here / Anne / or Pamela / clean and even / not here / not here /
time’s up voyager / go back to your ghosts / to the hurry of life-size in the small / or run to your barefoot girls / or blood-haired mother in her death-black robes / maybe they’ll have you / here / you’re just a sick child / sin and ashes on cardboard