9. TELL ME, SIMONE WEIL,
To be "a crippled no one"
doesn't exclude happiness?
It depends on where you got your cane.
Youth demanded caviar;
yet there's no shame for Lazarus
to dine on crumbs from God.
A satisfied belly
resurrects all--except you?
I have my doubts:
self-pity is inverse ambtion;
pride the obverse of despair.
Beggars aren't always losers:
just a little hint of butter
on a piece of mouldy bread
--That's my lot--Poison from Midas, yet
God's almost nothing is manna enough--
Sin thought life was privately unfair;
now I dine on air.
10. THE POET
At first you don't notice
something is missing, like
a spider with six legs.
Scurries with the best of them,
makes a proper web;
yet she's deficient:
partly a predator,
partly a fly, this
thing is so odd
faith chastises God:
why create misfits
with venom and wings?
11. FLAT SHARP AND NATURAL
I play scales on the piano
as well as I climb Jacob's ladder:
technically, spiritually,
my place is the bottom rung.
Yet when I really practice
Mozart and humility,
that most discriminating of all listeners
hears me in absolute silence
and, though I'm bad, is not displeased.
One music serves, the other soars,
and even a leper can reach God with both--
That's what I know; and that's what I believe.
12. THE SUPREME COMMANDER OF ANTS
ALSO CONTROLS YOU
To negotiate this field
where food is scarce
and peace even scacer,
you must follow orders
(even if you claim
you're free as birds,
which of course aren't free)
life obeys necessity
beetle to king--
Wizards and veils
are pure fictions.
You are one, too;
genes have invented
what helps them survive:
am, self. No matter,
follow your sham.
13. YOU'RE A MESS
You're a mess. Greed and
anger let you forget;
rage at the world;
spite overcomes it.
This has been our catechism
for over 10,000 years.
This is one exit, yet
life has many cages;
we choose our cells and
the worst one is this:
worship yourself and
praise God with your lips.
14. FAST FAITH
Jeeza will pleasya,
yet Wicca is quicka.
15. SEPARATION SONG
I am consciousness;
I was created by genes
somewhere around A.D.
minus two million and six.
Since then I've painted
wild horses and shamans,
and upside down churches
by thoughts called Chagall.
O I give up,
says the duck.
I am a dog
says the fox;
I am too fat
says the mantis;
hardy alive, says the virus,
I'm almost nothing at all.
I have created
Beethoven and Hitler,
Pablo Picasso and icing--
Peace, Laura Riding:
"The wind suffers from blowing;
the earth suffers from turning;
the sun suffers from burning,
and I from a living name."
O I give up,
says the duck.
I am a dog
says the fox;
I am too fat
says the mantis;
hardly alive, says the virus,
I'm almost nothing at all.
16. AT THE CUSP OF OLD AGE
To pass the time before she calls the ambulance
I shall write poems for several years.
I imagine they'll come to get me
just after I've mastered the simplest Bach prelude
(the one on your cell phone in C)
--if I'm unlucky that will take decades--
In clean white coats these professional
strangers will tell her I'm sorry,
It's too late to help him
(This I've known for over sixty years)
Until then, Mozart, Bach, Shakespeare and
fucking up trying to make others happy;
"a crippled no one" passing time. They're here!
Still writing? They'll just have to wait.
ADDENDUM: THE MIRACLE
My brother-in-law's
aunt is a saint--no kidding;
she was canonized in 2008,
the first Indian, ever.
She apparently didn't say much,
suffered a lot, taking
on the ills of others
and dying young from cancer.
"Did she ever do a miracle
for you?" "Yes, once."
We're eating at breakfast
nul puttu with coconut milk;
it is delicious.
"When I was young,(Aunty
had just died) while
shopping in a dusty village
just beyond Trivandrum,
I became very thirsty--
Amma forgot to take water--
Alphonsa Aunty, I begged,
please help me now--
At that moment a coconut
fell from a tree overhead!"
Don't say a word,
doubting Thomas--
You don't believe in miracles
yet you believe in God;
what kind of logic is that?
"Since then I have no doubts."
The Dawkins in me now
chooses not to analyze;
I, too, shopping for miracles
beneath God's indifferent sun,
had become very dry.
Who cares how it happened?
Thirst's gone.
To be "a crippled no one"
doesn't exclude happiness?
It depends on where you got your cane.
Youth demanded caviar;
yet there's no shame for Lazarus
to dine on crumbs from God.
A satisfied belly
resurrects all--except you?
I have my doubts:
self-pity is inverse ambtion;
pride the obverse of despair.
Beggars aren't always losers:
just a little hint of butter
on a piece of mouldy bread
--That's my lot--Poison from Midas, yet
God's almost nothing is manna enough--
Sin thought life was privately unfair;
now I dine on air.
10. THE POET
At first you don't notice
something is missing, like
a spider with six legs.
Scurries with the best of them,
makes a proper web;
yet she's deficient:
partly a predator,
partly a fly, this
thing is so odd
faith chastises God:
why create misfits
with venom and wings?
11. FLAT SHARP AND NATURAL
I play scales on the piano
as well as I climb Jacob's ladder:
technically, spiritually,
my place is the bottom rung.
Yet when I really practice
Mozart and humility,
that most discriminating of all listeners
hears me in absolute silence
and, though I'm bad, is not displeased.
One music serves, the other soars,
and even a leper can reach God with both--
That's what I know; and that's what I believe.
12. THE SUPREME COMMANDER OF ANTS
ALSO CONTROLS YOU
To negotiate this field
where food is scarce
and peace even scacer,
you must follow orders
(even if you claim
you're free as birds,
which of course aren't free)
life obeys necessity
beetle to king--
Wizards and veils
are pure fictions.
You are one, too;
genes have invented
what helps them survive:
am, self. No matter,
follow your sham.
13. YOU'RE A MESS
You're a mess. Greed and
anger let you forget;
rage at the world;
spite overcomes it.
This has been our catechism
for over 10,000 years.
This is one exit, yet
life has many cages;
we choose our cells and
the worst one is this:
worship yourself and
praise God with your lips.
14. FAST FAITH
Jeeza will pleasya,
yet Wicca is quicka.
15. SEPARATION SONG
I am consciousness;
I was created by genes
somewhere around A.D.
minus two million and six.
Since then I've painted
wild horses and shamans,
and upside down churches
by thoughts called Chagall.
O I give up,
says the duck.
I am a dog
says the fox;
I am too fat
says the mantis;
hardy alive, says the virus,
I'm almost nothing at all.
I have created
Beethoven and Hitler,
Pablo Picasso and icing--
Peace, Laura Riding:
"The wind suffers from blowing;
the earth suffers from turning;
the sun suffers from burning,
and I from a living name."
O I give up,
says the duck.
I am a dog
says the fox;
I am too fat
says the mantis;
hardly alive, says the virus,
I'm almost nothing at all.
16. AT THE CUSP OF OLD AGE
To pass the time before she calls the ambulance
I shall write poems for several years.
I imagine they'll come to get me
just after I've mastered the simplest Bach prelude
(the one on your cell phone in C)
--if I'm unlucky that will take decades--
In clean white coats these professional
strangers will tell her I'm sorry,
It's too late to help him
(This I've known for over sixty years)
Until then, Mozart, Bach, Shakespeare and
fucking up trying to make others happy;
"a crippled no one" passing time. They're here!
Still writing? They'll just have to wait.
ADDENDUM: THE MIRACLE
My brother-in-law's
aunt is a saint--no kidding;
she was canonized in 2008,
the first Indian, ever.
She apparently didn't say much,
suffered a lot, taking
on the ills of others
and dying young from cancer.
"Did she ever do a miracle
for you?" "Yes, once."
We're eating at breakfast
nul puttu with coconut milk;
it is delicious.
"When I was young,(Aunty
had just died) while
shopping in a dusty village
just beyond Trivandrum,
I became very thirsty--
Amma forgot to take water--
Alphonsa Aunty, I begged,
please help me now--
At that moment a coconut
fell from a tree overhead!"
Don't say a word,
doubting Thomas--
You don't believe in miracles
yet you believe in God;
what kind of logic is that?
"Since then I have no doubts."
The Dawkins in me now
chooses not to analyze;
I, too, shopping for miracles
beneath God's indifferent sun,
had become very dry.
Who cares how it happened?
Thirst's gone.
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